I'm a Hopeless Wanderer

So excited about the new Mumford and Sons album that just came out, so I named this blog post after one of my favorite songs.  Plus, the past couple times we have hired a car, the vehicle lacked an ipod jack and only came equipped with a Japanese radio system, and this was the only CD that we had…so naturally we have listened to it over a million times!  But, before I get ahead of myself…

I had my first exam last Wednesday and it was pretty easy and I felt good about it so I was happy to have one down.  The next two days, I studied/pretended to study with people in the library and took my second exam on Saturday afternoon.  Annoying to have a Saturday exam, but I hung out with Werner beforehand and had my first teza (iced tea sort of thing, but nothing like sweet tea) and after my exam, I went to a BYO at Indian Spice and then hung out with friends that night, so it ended up being a good day!

Sunday, Erin and I went to George Street for a sushi lunch date and then we relaxed in the Botanical Gardens lying in the grass and soaking up the warm sun!  Werner met up with us later and taught us how to properly throw a rugby ball so we tossed that around for a while.  It’s a lot easier to throw than the football!  Afterwards, I went to the gym and then went over to Liz’s for a girl’s night complete with endless episodes of Gilmore Girls, pizza, and laughter!

And Monday, we set off on another study break trip!  Werner and I picked up the rental car and tent and then we set off!  Poor Werner was the only guy, as Kelly, Erin, and Rachel were with us as well!  Our first stop after endless Mumford: Lake Tekapo.  And after numerous attempts to properly pronounce this place, I finally have it down!  The weather was absolutely gorgeous without a cloud in the sky; and wearing a flannel shirt and chacos never felt so good!  There is not much in the town except for the lake so we headed down there and hung out on the rocks.  Maybe it was just the perfect weather and setting, but Lake Tekapo is definitely high up on my list of favorite places!  The snow covered mountains that surrounded the lake were stunning and so mesmerizing!  We spent hours skipping rocks/teaching people to skip rocks and splashing our feet around in the water.  There is also a beautiful small historic church in front of the lake that we visited.  I decided that if I were to ever get married in NZ (although the chances of that are very slim so don’t worry Mom and Dad), I would hold the ceremony in that church! 

Soon we found of stomachs growling and drove down the road to find some food, but I guess in a small tourist town they can make everything twice as expensive, so we ended up with pre-made sandwiches from a convenient store, but we were content eating beside the lake.  After dinner, we headed to the campground to set up our tent.  The rates were a little pricey since they were per person, so we may have only actually checked in two people, but it worked out fine!

After setting up the tent, we hopped back in the car towards the lake to watch the sunset…which was perfect!  There was also a full moon that night, which was amazing to see.  Unfortunately, my camera is not capable of properly capturing any of this!  But here are a few pictures!  Once it was dark, we headed to the town tavern for some water and while there, made a list of everything we need to do/accomplish before leaving…which is a lot!  So I am going to be super busy my last week or so here!  But I still have another month and a half before I leave J

 

 

The next morning, we woke up at 5:45 to watch the sunrise.  We probably did not need to wake up quite so early since we had to wait for it to come over the mountains, but the extra time gave us a chance to drive down to the perfect viewing spot by the lake.  The sunrise was not full of colors, but the picture painted of the sun casted upon the mountains and green hills was completely worth the little sleep.  Once back to the campsite, we packed up, grabbed some desperately needed coffee, and after an embarrassing moment when asking for directions (just me being stupid since, as most of you know, I lack any sort of internal navigation system), we hit the road toward Mount Cook (Aoraki).  It was about an hour drive, but the views of Lake Pukaki on the way kept us glued to the car windows! 

 

Once we arrived at Mount Cook Village, we stopped at DOC (department of conservation) to ask them the best hikes in the area.  We had initially planned to actually tramp in the area into a hut a couple weeks ago, but that trip was canceled due to avalanche danger and the danger was still severe, so we just decided to go see the area.  But, we ended up hiking the Hooker Valley Track, which was the perfect choice for another stunningly beautiful day!  I was super excited to be hiking in shorts and a t-shirt!  We set off around noon with a view of snowy mountains surrounding us and a pale blue river running along the trail.  We took a quick detour to see Freda’s rock and monument.  She was the first woman to hike Mount Cook in the early 1900’s…and she did it in a skirt!  So legit!  I declared her my hero for the trip J  We even witnessed/heard a few avalanches in the mountains high above us. 

The hike was a perfect meander that was very pleasant and not too strenuous.  It took us about an hour or so to reach our destination: a beautiful lake with Mount Cook, the tallest mountain in NZ, rising behind it.  We snagged a giant rock to hang out on and eat our packed lunch.  We spent an hour or so soaking in the sun and exploring the area a little.  There were even a few mini “icebergs” in the water, which we surprisingly entertaining to watch change and break apart.  We really lucked up with the weather, as we were able to see the very top of Mount Cook!  One of my friends who previously visited it was unable to see more than a fifth of the mountain.  The whole mountain, especially the top peak, looked exactly like the mountain in “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.”  Eventually we reluctantly headed back to the car, and only then, did we realize that we were all beginning to turn a little pink/red (some more than others) from the sun.   We had not seen weather like this and had completely forgotten sunscreen.  NZ also receives more rays due to the ozone hole over the country, so my pale skin was certainly not ready for that!  But we all survived!

After the hike, we regrouped and drove down the road a few minutes to the blue lakes (which were actually green?) and then walked up a short path to an overview of a Glacial lake and the Tasman Glacier.  Afterwards, we hit the road toward Omarama.  Once to town, we drove out to the Clay Cliffs.  And the instant I saw them, I had to remind myself I was in New Zealand.  They are very reminiscent of Bryce Canyon National Park in Utah!  But very unique and interesting nonetheless.  So once we explored the cliffs, we hopped in the car and I drove us to Omaru, where we stopped at a KFC to eat dinner.  But basically, we just took all of our leftover lunch food inside and only a couple people bought anything.  They were probably not too happy with us, but oh well!  After we were full, we stopped to buy some aloe for our sunburns, and after a minor explosion when opening the bottle in the car, we set off for Dunedin.  Once back, I dropped everybody off and while getting ready for bed, locked myself out of my room.  Being too lazy to call Campus Watch that evening, I walked over to Erin’s and slept at her place because we were planning on waking up early the next day anyway.

 

So the next morning, out alarm went off at 5:15am!  Yikes!  But, it was totally worth the effort to get up and see one of the most beautiful sunrises (two in a row)!  We took the car up to the top of Mount Cargill and watched the sun rise above the ocean and Peninsula.  Absolutely gorgeous!  We also took pictures by the Dunedin city sign and then headed back to our flats to sleep for a couple more hours.  But of course I was still locked out, so I called Campus Watch and a guy came to let me in, but he grabbed the wrong set of keys and so he had to go back.  And he woke up all my flatmates with his super loud radio at 7am!  But once into my room, I took a nap and then returned the car and tent with Werner later that afternoon. 

And yesterday was also Halloween!  So we dressed up as the plastics from Mean Girls (because it was cheap and easy) and went to a small party at a friend’s house!

Happy Halloween everyone!  Sad I’m missing Franklin Street Halloween festivities, but I hope to see pictures soon!  Have fun J

Organic Living: Yummy Food and Great Company

Yay for a post that is on time this week!  Unfortunately that mans that I am procrastinating from studying for exams…go figure right? 

The end to last week was great!  I enjoyed a wonderful dinner with Werner at unicol Friday evening and then packed up my bags for a great adventure:  WWOOFing.

WWOOF (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms) is an international organization that links volunteers to organic farmers around the world.  Basically, you live on an organic farm, from anywhere between a week to even a year, and work in exchange for food and accommodation.  I had never heard of this before until I arrived in NZ, and since I am interested in sustainability and organic foods, I decided that it would be a great and very unique experience since I had plenty of time to kill before my first exam.  Plus, New Zealand is said to be the best place to WWOOF in the world!  So one of my friends from my urban geography class ,named Celine, and I decided to wwoof together!  That way we could study for our exam too (bet you can guess how well that studying actually went)!  So we found a great farm and signed up!

Saturday morning we woke up at 6am to meet our host at the Dunedin Farmer’s market!  It was pouring rain and not the most pleasant 20 minute walk carrying all of our bags, but our excitement kept us in good spirits.  I also killed my second umbrella that morning.  Not even going to attempt to purchase another one.  Anyway, all we knew was our host’s name, Shaun, and that he had a big white van.  Luckily it did not take us too long to find him, as he spotted us looking a little lost and greeted us with a big smile.  And then we went right to work helping him unpack his produce and set up the stand.  He is famous is NZ for his orange carrots, but he grows a large variety of veggies, including beets, leeks, parsnips, white carrots, chard, all kinds of lettuce, purple sprouting broccoli, garlic, Jerusalem artichokes, spinach, and even more that I can’t remember right now.  He stand is pretty popular so we aided in sales the rest of the time there and, in between customers, learned a lot about his organic farm and the veggies he grows. 

Once the market ended, we hopped in his van to head to his home in Clinton, which is about an hour and a half south of Dunedin.  On our way, we had some good conversation and were happy to hear him say that we would fit in great on the farm!  Once to Clinton, we settled into our house truck (like a campervan), became acquainted with the farm, and met the other WWOOFers there.  There was a girl from Brazil named Jamila, Miguel from Spain, Matilda from France, Ying from Malaysia (also an international student at Otago) and two girls from California who were traveling around the world for a year, but they left the next day (only mildly jealous of them)!  That night we hung out getting to know each other over dinner and snuggling up near the fire in the station (where all the WWOOFers hang out). 

Sunday was our first real day of work on the farm.  It was raining a good bit so we ended up working in the greenhouse all day, but that didn’t bother me.  It was mostly weeding around lettuce and chard.  After four hours of work, we made some lunch and hung out that afternoon.  That evening, Celine and I cooked dinner for everybody in the station.  On the weekends, the WWOOFers cook for themselves, but during the week, we all had dinner in Shaun’s house.  Monday pretty much consisted of the same routine with lots of weeding again.  Shaun cooked us potato and leek soup that evening with leeks that he picked that day! 

Tuesday brought a little more weeding around the pumpkins with Miguel and then a group effort clearing a large patch inside one of the greenhouses.  I attempted to study a little that afternoon, but ended up putting the books down for a cup of tea and great conversation!  Shaun made us a great spaghetti dish that night!  Wednesday we started harvesting for the market so in the morning Miguel, Ying, and I picked heaps of parsnips.  That afternoon, Celine, Matilda, and I worked in the garden and used a hoe to weed around baby carrot plants.  And the sandflies attacked.  I have so many bites on my arms and back it’s not even funny.  I remember at one point looking down at my clothes and seeing at least 20 sandflies all over me!  So itchy now!  Wednesday evening I also milked a cow for the first time ever!  Celine and I looked a little goofy in the field trying to round it up, but once she was in the milking area, Shaun showed us what to do.  It’s actually a lot harder than it looks.  But so cool at the same time!

 Thursday we picked purple sprouting broccoli as a group and then Ying and I sorted garlic for the market.  Thankfully garlic is a natural insect repellent so the sandflies avoided us and the inside of the cloves also provides instant itch relief!  That evening, Celine and I made artichoke and cauliflower soufflés.  I have never really eaten much artichoke, but I discovered that I absolutely love Jerusalem artichokes! 

 

 

And Friday, Celine and I picked lettuce and spinach in the morning and then worked in the packaging room for the rest of the day.  This day was definitely my favorite as I witnessed everything that went into preparing for the farmer’s market on Saturday.  Lots of washing, weighing, and packaging, but I honestly loved every second of it.  Shaun was an amazing host and I learned so much from him!  That afternoon, we all walked to “downtown” Clinton (it’s literally the epitome of a one horse town) for a bottle of wine to celebrate because everybody was leaving the next day.  That night Shaun whipped up his famous artichoke lasagna after much convincing/pleading from Celine and I.  That night we stayed up late chatting and hanging out with our wonderful new friends. 

 

The next morning, we said goodbye to the farm and Miguel, Celine, and I caught a bus back to Dunedin.  Last night, I went out with some friends (and even did a little swing dancing!) before cracking down to study today!  I have been in the library most of today…so lame, I know, but it needs to get done!  Missing my Starbucks pumpkin spiced lattes to help me study though.  And this blog was my study break, so I guess I need to get back to the books.  Have a wonderful week!

LWOC: Making Memories with Amazing Friends

Where did the semester go?  This week is the last week of classes.  I feel like I was just sitting in my first Otago class trying to figure out how the grading system worked here and now I only have one more class left!  I am definitely not okay with where the time went!  But anyway, enough stressing about that as I make the most of the time I have left here, which is still a little over two months!

It’s been a little bit longer since my last post than usual, but I have been pretty busy lately.  I don’t think last week was too exciting.  Tuesday, after class, I hung out with Werner for a while at my flat and then went to get ice cream with my mentor!  That night I watched the original Footloose with Rachel and her flatmates.  Most of you know that this is one of my favorite movies, but usually when I show it to people they think it’s a little weird.  But, Rachel loved it, which of course made me super happy!  We also booked a flight that night for after exams!

Wednesday was a typical day.  I had one class because my tutorial and my other lecture were canceled for the day!  I then had $3 lunch at clubs and societies on campus.  That night I watched the second Lord of the Rings with scenes filmed at the locations we visited last week!  It was cool to see the lake and where the buildings were in real life and compare it to the film. 

Thursday I skyped Kelsey!!! Yay!  It was so great to see her and catch up.  I also had my last God and Ethics lecture because my professor canceled class for the last week.  I think I have had more classes canceled here in the past two weeks than I ever had at UNC!  But I am a little sad that class is over because it was super interesting, the professor was amazing, and I learned so much!  That evening we went over to Anna’s flat and hung out for a while and then went to town.

Friday was was a pretty lazy day because we went to bed super late the night before.  In the afternoon, I visited a Maori marae through an organizied afternoon trip for international students .  It is a communal and sacred meeting place for the Maori.  Once there we had to be invited onto the land, take off our shoes before we entered, and introduce ourselves by touching noses.  The women sat in the back, behind the males.  Guests also must designate one male Maori speaker (somebody who is in the language class now spoke for us) who introduces the group and then sings a song that pertains to our culture.  After this introduction, they provided afternoon tea and explained the history of their ancestors and the marae.  It was very interesting and a great cultural experiemce!

 

Saturday we went to the Farmer’s Market, like we do any Saturday we are in town.  I love it so much and I think I am going to have to find some people to go to the one in Carrboro with when I get back!  After the market, it was a little rainy and very windy outside so we went to the gym and then just shopped around on George Street for a while.  That night, Erin, Rachel, and I made lamb stew.  We figured we should actually try some lamb since it is the main industry in New Zealand, so we found a super easy recipe for stew.  The last time I had lamb was probably about ten years ago and I remember not liking it, but I absolutely loved it this time.  It was an Irish stew with lamb, potatoes, carrots, and beer (terrible picture below).  When I first arrived here, I was nervous about cooking for myself and other people, but I have actually really come to like cooking and experimenting!  And everybody seems to like what I cook J  The stew that night was very filling and afterwards I had some friends over to hang out.  We were being so goofy and I laughed so hard.  And eventually we went to town for a little while!

 

Sunday we woke up to a bright blue sky and decided to take advantage of it.  So we ran over to Wynton’s to borrow his (American) football and then caught a bus headed to St. Clair Beach.  I was wearing jeans, but it was so nice and warm!  We took a nice walk along the beach, breathed in the warm air, buried our toes in the sand, and laughed and shared stories.  We found a nice warm sand dune to lounge around on and then we passed around the football for a while.  It was a perfect day J  After the sun began to set and the temperature started dropping, we walked back to the beachfront shops, sipped on a cup of coffee, and then grabbed the bus back to the university.  Once we got back, Erin and I returned a jacket that some random guy had given her on the street the night before.  She looked cold apparently, so he insisted she take his jacket to town.  Afterwards, we went over to Wynton’s to return his football and hang out for a while.  And he even gave us some of the shrimp he had made.

Monday, I mailed in my absentee ballot, which was super exciting.  It’s my first time voting in a presidential election!

This week, we also celebrated LWOC!  At UNC, the last day of classes (LDOC) is always a crazy day filled with silliness and hanging out with friends before everybody buckles down before exams.  So we decided it would be a great idea to have LWOC (last week of classes) and make the whole week a big celebration.  We also know that once people start exams and begin to travel/go home, we will never be together like we have been over the semester, so we wanted as much fun packed into one week that we could get!  Monday night I went to Indian Spice for a BYO with Rachel, Erin, Scott, Katie, Anna, Emma, and Nicole.  The curry was great, but the friendship and laughter was even better.  After dinner, we went to The Bog for trivia night and met up with Marvin, Wynton, and Chris there too.  This had been something we had wanted to do all semester, but it just never happened, so we finally made ourselves go!  Our team name:  Quiz in my pants.  And we did not lose!  But we may have come in second to last.  In our defense, however, a lot of the questions were related to random NZ facts that we would have had no way of knowing!  I mean, they were asking us to identify NZ chocolate bars and all of their Olympic athlete flag bearers.  But we made up some pretty funny answers for the questions we didn’t know.  And I think the team that came in last was a group of internationals, so at least we have learned more than them in our time here!  That night, Wynton and Erin came back to my flat and we hung out for a while. 

Tuesday, I had my last Urban Geography class.  It was kind of boring because we just went over exam preparation, but helpful too.  After class, I had coffee with Werner at the Otago Museum.  Our coffee dates are always so great!  That night I made chicken pie and potatoes for my flat and then we went to The Bog again for Open Mic Night.  This time it was only Marvin, Erin, Anna, and Liz. 

And finally yesterday.  I did not have any classes, because, like I said, professors really like to cancel classes during the last week.  They say they do it to give us more time to study for exams, which is a really ironic concept to me anyway.  I am used to having five exams within a week, with more than one in a day even.  It’s a week where I don’t leave the library, live off of coffee, stay up to unheard of hours, and am not ashamed of wearing sweatpants every day.  Well, here it’s the exact opposite.  The exam period lasts a whole month.  Meaning I have only three finals in a month.  What in the world?  I don’t even know what to do with myself.  My first final is not even until Oct 24!  Kiwis seem to be stressing over them (more understandable since I am just on pass/fail credit), but luckily I am still relaxed!  I won’t even be in Dunedin for the next seven days!  I won’t tell you what I am doing now, but it should be a very unique and exciting experience!  Anyway, so yesterday I went to the final mentor get-together, where we were fed pizza and honored all of the mentors.  Mine has been so great!  After dinner, we went over to Anna’s flat and hung out and then we all came back to my flat and hung out with Sophie, Bob, and some of their friends.  We also went to the last Pint Night of the semester at the campus bar called Refuel and then met up with Wynton and Marvin at The Cook for a little silly dancing!

And this morning, we walked up the George Street for brunch because Erin and I had a 2 for 1 coupon.  Yay for saving money!  And now I am just about to head to my last class at Otago.  I am not sure I am entirely okay with that!  Okay, enough nostalgic moments.  Hope everybody in Boone is not having too much trouble with the water!  Miss everybody J Cheers!            

Living Young, and Wild, and Free

Hello everyone!  I am sitting inside our “union” area with a coffee after just meeting with somebody to plan trips for my month after exams and figured I should write my blog for the past week.  I always have a hard time remembering what happened at the beginning of the previous week, but let’s see here.  Tuesday I went to class and it was a pretty normal day.  I cooked my Dad’s famous white bean chicken chili for dinner and it turned out great (but I guess not as good as yours Dad)!  That night some friends and I watched the season premieres of How I Met Your Mother and New Girl.  After the shows, Erin, Audrey, Rachel, Anna, and I went to the Bog for Open Mic Night.  One of the international girls was playing and she is absolutely amazing!  We hung out there for a while and somewhere in that time decided that we needed to create our own Red Card.  I had already participated in Sophie’s Red Card this semester, but I missed half of it and we decided we needed to have one of our own and go all out!  So we decided to make it last throughout the day and created a school girl theme.  Wednesday I only had one class because my other one got canceled this week, so that was nice to have more of my day free.  Wednesday night, Rachel and I planned our part of the Red Card.

Thursday was the big day!  It was the day of our Red Card and time to go all out!  Erin and I went on a run in the morning and then we changed into our school girl outfits for the day.  The rules of the Red Card included everybody dressing up like school girls and going to as many classes as possible.  I looked so crazy!  I mean, I was wearing my hair in pig tails and borrowed a tie from Nathan.  We had a point system, and we earned points for how many classes attended, number of questions answered, number of questions asked, number of high fives given, number of selfies taken in class, etc.  I attended my own two classes for the day and then also went to Rachel’s Pacific Studies class, where I learned about music in Fiji, and my flatmate Nathan’s recitation where I learned absolutely nothing about finance.  In Pacific studies I even answered a question and was asked to elaborate!  But I was right and I earned some points!  Erin and I went to Nathan’s class and we sat in the back of a class of about 12 people.  Nathan could barely keep a straight face to teach and we had no clue what he was talking about (it was advanced finance) so we just ended up writing down funny pick-up lines with the finance words he was saying!  After classes were finished for the day, we all met in a little courtyard in the university for “Orientation” where superlatives were awarded for a plethora of different categories.  I won most studious because I answered the most questions haha J  Then the official Red Card began with the whole group!  There were about 10 of us.

The first activity, planned by Erin and Audrey, was a scavenger hunt around the university and town.  And the things on the list were absolutely ridiculous.  In that hour, I ran up an escalator that was going down, proposed to a high school boy in the mall (I have no clue why he turned me down though), got wrapped up like a mummy in a bathroom, ate a double scoop of ice cream as a group (it’s huge), protested the killing of lambs, sang “Call Me Maybe” on the streets, went Christmas caroling, asked a high school couple about their future plans, joined a zumba class for like 3 minutes, had a thumb war with Campus Watch, asked random people where I could find a vegetarian meat pie, ran through campus screaming, and a million other crazy things that I can’t remember right now!  Never have I had so many crazy looks in my life!  But we never thought twice and I have probably not laughed that long in forever!  And my group won the scavenger hunt!!!  After that, we met back up at my flat, grabbed a quick dinner, and moved onto phase 2 : Trivia!  Anna made up questions that could have real answers, but the right answers were always something related to past events in NZ.  It was a good break from running around town, but once we finished, it was time for our final phase: Recess!  Rachel and I had planned this part and it turned out great!  By this time, it was dark outside so we went to the rugby field near our flats and completed different relay races.  We played leap frog, the game where you spin around ten times with a bat and then have to run back, wheel barrow (Scott dropped me and I face planted during this), and a race where we had to crawl through each other’s legs.  All doing this in skirts and in the dark!  Afterwards, we went back to Anna, Kelly, and Emma’s flat to relax for a couple hours before the last part of the Red Card: going to town that evening in our school girl outfits!  And yes, it did happen and it turned out to be a great, and certainly memorable, day and night!

 

 

Friday, I went to the grocery store with Erin ad Rachel to pick up supplies for that night.  With the weather looking absolutely wonderful (a rarity in Dunedin), we decided to take advantage of it and go camping Friday night at Long Beach.  We had one car, but the beach was only about a half hour away so we shuttled people back and forth and in the end, there was about 15-20 of us there!  I was in the first shuttle, so once there we walked the 20 minute walk to the caves at the end of the beach that we were planning on sleeping in.  They were huge!  And the perfect place to camp!  We didn’t even need tents, which was a good thing since we didn’t bring any.  While waiting on the other groups, we hung out on the beach for a while, collected some firewood in the nearby woods, and started the fire.  Once everybody got there, we had the fire going strong and it was time for dinner.  We had brought sausages (they don’t have hotdogs here) to roast over the fire so we stuck then on some sticks and had a great dinner!  We also brought supplies that resembled s’mores.  NZ does not have normal marshmallows or gram crackers though, so we ended up using oddly shaped marshmallows and malt ginger thin cookies.  But we were determined to have them because our German friend, Marvin, had never tasted one before.  However, even with the major substitutions, he still loved it and they were a success!  Afterwards, we just hung around the fire joking around, singing along to a couple ukuleles, and telling stories. 

 

 

 

Once part of the group went to bed around midnight, Erin, Marvin, Rachel, Emma, and I went down to the ocean to hang out and ended up joining a group of Kiwis, who were also camping there, for the next couple hours.  They also had a guitar and loved to sing so we sang along with them too around their fire.  We eventually went to bed, but not for long because we (Rachel, Erin, Marvin, and I) were up before 6am to watch the sunrise.  We were definitely living by the philosophy that you can sleep when you’re dead!  So even though it was a little cloudy, it was still nice to get up and see the sun reflect off the clouds!  And by that time, we just decided not to go back to bed.  So we took a long walk to the end of the beach and climbed around on some rocks.  It warmed up pretty nicely through so once everybody was up, we just hung out on the beach in the sand (still too cold to swim this far south on the island).  Eventually, we decided it was time to go so we began the shuttles back.  Once back in Dunedin, I took a shower and then a much needed two hour nap.  Afterwards, I went over to Erin and Rachel’s flat and we purchased flight tickets for our travels after exams.  I will let my travels be a surprise, but really there are only a couple guesses J 

Sunday morning, I woke up early to meet Colleen (Rachel’s kiwi host), my flatmate Margaux, Rachel, and Malika to make a journey to Middle Earth and Rohan!  For those of you who don’t know, they are places in Lord of the Rings.  It was a two hour drive, but luckily Colleen had a car so no renting this time!  I am obviously not a huge Lord of the Rings fan considering I had not even seen the first movie until about a month or so ago, but it was still a great trip!  We went to the area where many of the scenes from the second movie were filmed.  We had great weather and the landscape was beautiful.  It was a very rocky area so we did lots of climbing over rocks and even recreated the movie in a set of mini video of us J  So I am excited to watch the second movie soon!

 

 

 

And now I am finished my coffee and want to go enjoy the sunny day outside!  Have a great week everybody! 

Icy a Glacier...Sweet As!

(Pun Translation:  I see a glacier)

Last week was filled with some silliness in our flat!  There is this kind of strange, but cute at the same time, painting of a fox that was hanging in our flat at the beginning of the semester.  But a couple months ago, Bob stole it and hung it up in his flat.  So last week, Sophie and I decided it was time to plan a rescue mission.  I mean, the fox just looked so sad in Bob’s flat!  So Monday night, while Bob was cooking dinner in our flat, we snuck out and snatched the painting and returned it to its rightful place.  And being our crazy selves, we acted like ninjas in the dark jumping around and hiding behind corners (obviously there was nobody near us), even tossing the painting to one another to avoid “attacks.”  Thankfully, the fox is now safe with us again J  That night I watched a movie with some mates and worked on a little homework.

Tuesday I went to class and hung out with some friends.  That night I cooked some baked ziti for my flat and fun fact: NZ does not actually have ziti noodles in the store and nobody knew what I was talking about.  Thankfully, they all enjoyed my “foreign” dish!  That night we watched a couple episodes of Game of Thrones as a flat.  Sophie has been begging me to watch this show, and at first I was a little weary because it looked like something out of a video game, but it’s actually quite good!

Wednesday I came down with a little cold so I stayed in most of the day chugging orange juice, tea, and taking as much vitamin C as possible because I didn’t want to be sick for my weekend trip!  I think it worked because I felt better the next day!

And then Thursday rolled around!  Erin and I woke up early and went to the grocery store to get some food for the road and then I headed to my last tutorial for my geography class.  It’s so crazy that I only have three more weeks left of school!  Did I not just get here?  Anyway, after class, Erin and I took her Kiwi host’s car to go pick up our rental car for the weekend.  The only rental company that rents to 18 year olds is at the airport, which is a 20 minute drive from our flat, but it’s worth it to have a car obviously (NZ public transport is okay, but only to larger cities).  So I drove our car back into town, we picked up the rest of the gang (Emma, Katie, and Anna), and hit the road.  It was a good 6 hour drive to Fox Glacier, but it went by super-fast jamming out to music, talking, and being silly.  While Erin was driving, she hit a bird, which in itself is pretty bad.  But later on, she earned the nickname animal killer when she also killed a possum in the road.  And for some reason, both times she hit the animals; I started laughing, so of course I earned the nickname morbid laugher.  We were quite the pair!

But we finally made it to the small town we were staying at, and the Fox Glacier tourist attraction is probably the only reason the town even exists!  Our backpackers was super cute and rustic and when we checked in around 8pm, the owner said he was taking a few people to go see some glow worms down the road and invited us to come.  Even though we were starving, we decided to go.  So the 5 of us plus three guys who worked there led us to a path a few minutes from the backpackers.  At this point, he told us to turn off all lights, grab the person in front of you, and walk.  The problem:  it was pitch black and we couldn’t see anything.  There were even bridges on the path that had no railings.  At one point, I think we all realized just how trusting we were of these complete strangers luring us into the woods with the opportunity to see glow worms.  I mean, they say beware of people with candy in the US, but maybe it’s glow worms in NZ.  Anyway, with a little freaking out in the dark and trying to walk in a line, we finally made it to the hundreds of glow worms hanging out on the bottom of a fallen tree.  The guys were actually very knowledgeable about them and I learned that it’s their poop that makes them glow…for some reason that made them less attractive!  I was very appreciative of him to show them to us since it was my first time seeing them!  Afterwards, we grabbed some food in town at the only place that was open and then went to bed pretty quickly.

 

 

The next morning, we woke up early to walk down the road (like 30 seconds) to the Fox Glacier Tour meeting place.  We had booked the full day Nimble Fox glacier tramp and it was totally worth it!  I am usually not a huge fan of tours and would rather do things on my own, but this was a tour that provided both instruction and freedom, which was really cool and unique.  The company provided us with boots, crampons (the spikes on the boots that dig into the ice), and rain gear.  Our tour guide was a Kiwi named Sam who was just a couple year older than us.  It didn’t hurt that he was pretty good looking as well J And he was awesome for putting up with 5 ridiculously silly girls who pushed all the boundaries of what we could do!  The tour started out with a ten minute bus ride to what used to be the bottom of the glacier, but is now just forest.  The glacier actually recedes up to 3 meters a day, so it is always changing and in my lifetime will probably disappear.  Glad I came when I did!  Anyway, the first part of the tour was an hour hike up 700 stairs from the car park to the present start of the glacier.  It was a lot of uphill, but provided some beautiful views of the glacier. 

 

 

Once to the ice, we strapped on our crampons and away we went.  Sam took us through crevices, caves, and tunnels up into the glacier.  It was sweet as (a kiwi phrase meaning sweet or awesome)!  He even let us carry his pick ax and take pictures with it.  And although weary every time we decided to wander off from the rest of the group for a picture or just to explore, he was willing to give us some freedom!  And except for a little rain around lunchtime, we had great weather and even saw the very rare NZ blue sky for part of the day!  When we were on our way back down from the glacier, we decided it was beer o’clock and opened our few beers that we had packed and drank them on the glacier.  I mean seriously, when am I ever going to drink beer on a glacier again?  Sam and the two couples that were with us in our group loved it!  We really lucked up with an excellent tour guide and group.  Once off the glacier, we took the shortcut back to the car park and passed by a glacial pool.  Sam told us that he had only had 4 people in one group to jump in it in one day.  Well there were five of us, and we took that statement as a challenge!  So we took off our boots and jumped it.  Burr…it was freezing, but so fun at the same time!  We quickly hopped onto the warm bus and headed back to town.

 

However, on the bus ride we heard that the road back to Wanaka (where we were headed that night) closed at 7pm due to a rockslide.  I remembered passing the rockslide because it covered most of the road and was pretty bad, but I never saw a sign that said it was closed.  Well at this point it was about 5pm and they said it would take about 2 hours to get past the slide.  So once the bus parked, we flew out of it, exchanged our boots for our normal shoes, received our certificates saying we survived the glacial hike, thanked Sam, changed half of our clothes in the parking lot and away we went.  Some of us were even half wet still.  But we headed out of town not even checking the gas level.  And we remembered literally nothing in between Wanaka and Fox Glacier.  So when Erin noticed the gas light come on, we were hoping we would somehow make it.  But we were still 2 hours outside of Wanaka and we had not even hit the rock slide yet and it was already past 7 and I was beginning to think that even if we did make it through the road, we were going to be spending the night in the car without any gas.  Then out of nowhere, a gas station/accommodation/café appears on the side of the road.  So we whip in there and even through the gas station is closed, Anna runs inside to beg for gas.  But while doing so, we talk to a guy that had just been turned around from the road block so we figured we were stuck there for the night.  So we grabbed some dinner and I called the backpackers in Wanaka to make sure that they would refund us.  Thankfully, we only had to pay the 10% booking fee!  So we ended up staying at this really cute place and going to bed not having a clue where we were.  A little stressful, but it all worked out!  We woke up the next morning to a beautiful little cottage area surrounded by snow covered mountains and figured out we were in a small “town” (as in a school and this café) known as Makarora.  Once we ate a little breakfast we had packed and grabbed some petrol, we hit the road again.  And thank goodness that place was there, not only because we were sure we would have run out of gas before Wanaka, but also because we were able to see the beautiful scenery of Lake Hawea that we would never have seen in the dark!  The sun was shining, we had our shades on, and we were happy J 

We stopped in Wanaka to grab some coffee and sit by the lake for a little while.  I have been/passed though Wanaka three times, but this was the only time I had seen the town and lake when it was not raining.  And it was just so perfect of a day!  The rest of the drive back was great and Erin and I took the car back Saturday evening.  That night, some friends came over to my place and then we went to town! 

In town, we met up with some people, one of them being Michael, who happened to have corporate tickets from where he works (graduated from uni last year) to the Otago vs. Tasman rugby game and so Erin and I went to the game with him and some of his friends.  It was such a nice day and it was fun experiencing more Kiwi culture through sports!  After the game, the guys dropped us back off at my place and Erin and I experimented with making potato and leek soup.  It turned out pretty tasty!

And today I went to my last tutorial for my religion class, cleaned my room, and worked on some homework.  And then after dinner Werner, Erin, Rachel, Liam and I watched the movie “Taken” and now I am sitting in my bed well past midnight writing this blog!  But I probably should get some sleep.  Cheers!