Catch up!

Well, it has been awhile and A LOT has happened. I will write this blog in little parts to catch up on life so far.

Leaving NZ-
It was hard to say good bye to my students as well as the teachers and great friends I made. My friends from church there had an awesome BBQ for me before I left. I was so lucky to have met such cool and caring people. I was sad to leave NZ, but I was excited about what was ahead. I know I will come back some day.

Fiji-
I then headed off to Fiji. Just me and my suitcase. I never thought I would travel to a tropical island alone, but it was awesome! The first night I stayed in a hostel with 40 people to a room in Nadi, Fiji. The next 3 nights I stayed at the Octopus Resort on Waya Island. It was amazing. It was so gorgeous. Too hard to explain how gorgeous it was in words. Look at the pics! Then I spent one more night back in Nadi before flying home.

Coming home-
It was so good to see my family. After over 40 hours in planes and airports I was so ready to be home. My mom and sister picked me up at the airport. It took awhile to adjust back into life here again, but it was so good to be back. The day after I flew in I drove downstate to see my grandparents and my cousin Jennifer who is getting married soon! It was such a good week with them.

G.E.-
Now I am back home teaching third grade for Great Explorations, which is a fun summer school. It has been really fun so far, but I come home exhausted at the end of the day after playing with kids for 8 hours!

Shell Lake-
Last weekend I went to my friends Katie and Ryan's wedding in Shell Lake, WI. It was so much fun! It was great to see all of my bestest buds again. I hadn't seen anyone since before Christmas. The wedding was beautiful, but the whole weekend went by way to fast.

Now-
Now I am teaching at GE and enjoying the warm weather while I get everything in order to move up to Alaska. I love the sun and am trying to soak it all up before I move to the Arctic!!

New Pics and Exciting News

I put some more pics onto my website. Now that Megan is gone I will be posting most of my pics onto my site. So check it out!
The other exciting news is that I just booked my plane tickets to Fiji!!! I leave a week from tomorrow for 5 days in the sun and surf! Thanks Grampa and Maggie!

Waihi Weekends

Last weekend was my first weekend without major travel plans since Megan left. Friday night I had some guys from church over for a Mexican meal. I made them some wonderful tacos using my great cooking skills. Haha. Saturday I went to see some of my kids play rugby and netball. It was fun to watch them play and they were really excited that I came to see them play. Saturday night Kristy and I went to a Pink Floyd tribute concert at the beach pub. We thought it would be pretty cool, but it turned out that it was a bunch of middle-aged people in their black t-shirts drinking away and I was with my baby blue polar fleece on. I felt a bit out of the loop. So Kristy and I left and came back to my house for junk food and a chick flick. Sunday was church and that night for the evening service I lead the worship team. It was really fun and it made me being on a worship team a lot (I did it at university for awhile). This week has been pretty good. It is crazy trying to get everything done before I leave. And I am planning my trip to Fiji!!! I cannot wait!

Graduation!

I graduated from UMD today!!!!

Moving to Alaska

So, as if life isn't crazy enough, I am moving to Alaska in August! The adventures continue! I interviewed for a teaching job there on Wednesday and was hired yesterday! I am thrilled! I know I am using a lot of exclamation points, but I am just excited! I will be teaching grades 6-12 English and possibly Social Studies at St. Paul School on St. Paul Island in the Bering Sea. My sister is currently teaching elementary school there and my brother-in-law teaches high school. Another friend from home was also hired yesterday to teach elem. school as well. I am so pumped! I know it will be tough to be so far away, but then again, hey I have been living across the world for four months already. It will be such a great learning experience. I cannot wait! YAHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Pics

Megs and I put up more pics on her website. For some reason they show up at the bottom of that page. But they are there and ready for viewing and I will put up more soon!

Life is Crazy!

Okay, so a lot has happened since I last wrote on here. So I shall break it up into chunks for you.

Beach Hop-
Two weekends ago Megs and I chilled in Waihi. It was weird to be there for a weekend when we are usually out traveling, but it was really nice to relax. That Saturday we went to the Whangamata Beach Hop. It is basically a classic car showcase. There were classic cars lining the roads. People were dressed in 50's clothes and there were bands and vendors everywhere. It was a gorgeous day. We sat on the beach for quite awhile too. I love the beach! Sigh.

Auckland-
Megs and I hit up Auckland last weekend. We hadn't had much of a chance to check out New Zealand's biggest city so we went to see what it was all about. We brought Myles along with us for the trip. We dropped him off to see some friends and us gals went off into the town. We ate a bite to eat and then hit the markets in the town square. I love the markets. They are really artsy and sometimes really cheap! There were street performers all around. It was great. We hit up some other stores wishing we had more room in our suitcases to bring stuff home. We checked out a park and then the Sky Tower. The Sky Tower is the tallest building in the southern hemisphere. It has amazing views of Auckland. Gorgeous. I think it is safe for me to tell people now that I then dropped Megan off at the airport. She didn't want anyone to know she was going home so she could surprise them. So I have had to be hush hush for awhile. It was hard to say goodbye to such a great travel partner. But I didn't cry! After we hugged goodbye and I saw her off, I had to try and catch up with Myles. I drove around Auckland for an hour completely lost! Not a shocker if you know me! haha. I finally found him and we headed off with his cousins and some friends of his to a cocktail party. It was really fun. I felt a little out of place at first but I met tons of great people and even taught people how to swing dance there! It was a late night. We stayed at Myles cousin's house that night and headed back to Waihi on the way home. We stopped at the Karangahake Gorge to checkout a cool waterfall on the way.
That night it was weird to be alone in my house without Megs, but I was so exhausted I just feel right to sleep.

This week-
This week has gone by so fast. I cannot believe it. I only have two weeks left here at the school. I am going to miss the kids so much. My supervisor came in for the last time to observe me. It is weird to have everything winding down now.
Wednesday I went surfing again with Myles and his cousin and I actually got up on the board! Not for long, but when I did I screamed and then lost it! haha. I also got wacked on my head with my board. As I was out there surfing the sun was setting and it was gorgeous. I realized how lucky I am. As I am sitting there in the waves trying to get back on my board like a beached whale I hear "hi". I turned around to see some of the Year 8 kids (who are competitive surfers) out there riding the waves and waving at me. I tried to pretend like I was just waiting to a good wave, paddling away on my board, when one crashed into me and threw me off. I looked like such a dork out there! haha. Well, the kids thought it was cool that I was trying anyway!

Surfing!

Today after school, one of the other student teachers, Miles, took Megan and I surfing. It was so fun! Since it is fall here, the weather is a little chilly and it gets dark pretty early, like 6ish. But we didn't know how many more chances we would get to try and surf. We left school grabbed the boards and wetsuits and headed to the beach. Miles said the waves weren't that great, but they looked big to me! We all put our wetsuits on (I had to put mine on twice, because apparently I had it on backwards the first time) and headed out to the waves. Miles gave us a quick lesson and then we were off. We "surfed" for an hour or so. I had so much water in my mouth and ears by the end of it and I am pretty sure I looked like a drown rat (notice no pictures were taken of this). We stayed in until it got dark and by the end I was able to get onto one knee a few times but was nowhere near standing up! That will take a lot more practice. My goal is to get up on two knees on my board before I go home. It might take awhile. Guess I will just have to keep going for it until I get it down!

Wellington

I tried posting this ages ago and for some reason it wouldn't post. So, I forgot to say in the previous post that Megs and I stopped in Nelson in the South Island at the museum of Wearable Art. It was so cool and weird! There were the craziest costumes! After Megan and I left the South Island we stayed at Ruth and Michael's house. They are our host parents kids. The next day we walked around Wellington. We checked out the national museum, which was huge! Then we took the cable car up to the city gardens where there was a great view of the city. After that we walked back down and checked out all the parliment buildings. That night Michael made us a fantastic meal and Sunday morning we were off. We drove back to Waihi sad to say good bye to our adventure but happy to sleep in real beds!

The Last of the South Island Adventures

Not only did Megs and I hit up all the adventure areas of Queenstown, we also enjoyed some of the city life. We went to every souvenir shop imaginable! There were little arts and craft tables set up along the lakefront and a concert was going on. While we were walking around I saw a girl I had gone to school with walk down the street! I knew she was working in Abel Tasman for a few months, but I didn't think I would run into her. What a small world!
That night we went to the Minus 5 Degree bar. Now I am not a big bar person, but this was cool. The ice bar originated in Sweden and are now found in a few other places. It is a popular place to go, even with families and kids, so we had to make reservations. You are alotted a half hour in the bar. Before we went in, we were fitted with fur trimmed parkas and gloves. The whole room is made of ice, and I mean EVERYTHING; the bar, the seats, and the glasses! There were amazing ice sculptures everywhere. That was cool. We met a crazy group of English backpackers when we were there, which made for a good time.
After all the Queenstown craziness we drove on to Wanaka. We stayed at a campsite that night. The next day we went into town to check everything out. We heard from a friend it was pretty cool. Wanaka is situated right on a lake and because it is fall here, the scenery was beautiful. Along the lakewalk was a photography display. There were huge aerial photos displayed all about the changing enviroment and learning to care about the earth we live on. We walked through display for about an hour. That was also very cool. We did some shopping and again headed on to Franz Josef.
Franz Josef is a huge glacier set back in a big rock valley with rainforesty-type woods surrounding it. We stayed at the Rainforest Holiday Park that night, and prepared for our full-day glacier hike the following day. That morning we headed to the Franz Josef center where we were fitted with raincoats, over trousers, wool socks, boots, crampons (grips strapped to the bottom of your boots), hats and mittens. We boarded a bus and off we went. We were in a group of about 10 and a guide. We spent the next 7 hours together exploring around. I was super excited about it, since I see cold and snow all the time, but it was awesome. We even got to use ice picks. We wandered up the glacier where the views of the valley were gorgeous. We tramped through blue crevaces and all arounded. By the end of the day, we were really tired out! We made tacos for dinner, took a warm shower and were in bed by 7:45!
The following morning we headed to Lake Mathison, a well known scenic lake. the backdrop of the lake are the snow covered mountains that are reflected in the water. Again, gorgeous.
Okay, moving on....
The rest of the day we drove through to Abel Tasman. It was a long day of driving; about another 8 hours total. But we stopped at great places along the way. We drove down the highway along the beach, so we stopped for pictures here and there. We also saw Pancake Rocks. On the beach are these massive layered rock formations. When we get the pictures up, you will see what I am talking about. We finally made our way to Abel Tasman and booked a hostel for the night. Yeah, no sleeping in the back of the van! After 13 nights, it was nice to have a break!
Abel Tasman national park is right near the top of the south island. It is known for it's aqua waters and white beaches. In fact, it was one of the top five beaches in the world! The thing to do here is go out on a kayak trip, since most of the beaches can only be reached by water. We booked the "Royal with Cheese" all-day trip. When we got there, one of the guides told us that they drew peoples names for an upgrade to a better kayak package and we had won! So, we were put on the trip that was twenty bucks more and we got it for the same price as the other. We met our guide, Gloria, who was awesome and the other four kayakers in our group. They came from, Israel, France, England, and Austrailia. What a multicultural group! We were fitted into our life jackets and boarded the water taxi that brought us to the beach we would be launching from. The kayaks were two-person, so Megs was in the back in charge of steering and I was in the front. Our guide told us that we were sure to see some seal pups along the way. Not ten minutes after we got going we spotted seals doing there thing on the rocks; lazing in the sun and making noise! Gloria suggested we head to this secluded lagoon where there are usually some seal pups. She said we would be able to get there because it was still high tide. The lagoon was so pretty, but there were no seals in sight. We paddled on further to a little cove. All of a sudden these pups emerged from the trees on the banks and started swimming around our boats. Gloria said they were about 4 months old and often the mother leaves them there for the day while she goes out because they are safe in the cove. One of the pups grabbed onto a rope tied to Gloria's kayak and was swimming and plaing with it. We are watched and pulled our kayaks up side by side. The seals were so playful! Our kayaks was resting on top of a tree that was in the water. The pups would walk on the log and come up to sniff our kayak. All of a sudden, one jumped onto the kayak next to us and sat there for awhile. Gloria was laughing so hard. She said this had never happened before! We are all taked pictures like crazy when another one jumped onto ours. But instead of sitting there, he came up to me and sat on my spray skirt, right on my lap and sniffed my life jacket! haha. Gloria couldn't believe it! After awile we got out to swim with them. The water was freeezing and we were in the shade, so it didn't last long. But the seals would dodge all around us. They were swimming in between Megan's legs and one grabbed the tie on my life jacket and started pulling it! It was the highlight of the trip! Eventually we headed out of the lagoon because the tide was going out. We paddled to a beach where we had the lunches that were provided for us. We even got mochaccinos! Yum! Gloria said she had a surprise for us. She pulled a violin out of her kayak and started playing it. It was so cool. Beach, catered lunch, mochaccino, sun, and violin music. How lucky is that? Total paradise. We explored some more beaches and even sailed our kayaks. Yeah, sailed them. We connected them all together out in the water by holding on to each other's boats. Then the back people tied a tarp the their oars and raised it in the air, the front people (me), held onto the other corners down low and away we went. It was one of the best days, our group was awesome and the weather couldn't have been better! Abel Tasman was one of the most gorgeous places we went to! I loved it!!! We were freezing by the end of the day and headed back to the hostel for dinner and hot showers.
This brings us up to today. Basically we drove from Abel Tasman so Nelson, where we stopped and explored the city and then drove on to Picton, where we are now. We only have a few hours left on the South Island. In fact, we board the ferry in about 2 hours to head back to the North. I am sad to leave here. I fell in love with the South Island. Tonight we are staying at our host parents' other child's house in Wellington. Tomorrow we plan to check out the capital and then head back to Waihi on Sunday to get ready for the last five weeks of teaching.
So, for now I am off since I have been sitting at United Video store to type this! haha.
Love you all.

Adventure Guru

Well, I am alive! So Megs and I both did the canyon swing. Basically, you stand out on a platform 300 ft. above the canyon. It is sort of like bungy jumping. You have a rope and harness attached to your waist by your belly button. You can choose to jump off anyway you want. Megan hung upside down! No way. Not for me. I got up there to the edge and was shaking to bad! I held onto my rope and then stepped off. I started to scream, but then you are going too fast that you can't make noise anymore! You drop to the bottom and then swing back and forth until they raise you up again. It was a rush, that is for sure!!!! Celebrities like Adrien Brody, Jack Osborne, and Jack Black have done the swing too! About 3 hours later Megs and I got in a plane and jumped out of it! Ahhh!!!! I went skydiving! It was so amazing. When we first got there I was more excited than the day before. Our van driver said it isn't scary once you are in the air. It said it is more euphoric than frightening. This eased my fears. We got all siuted up and the guy who was helping me introduced himself as Uros. I asked if he was my instructor (the one who would jump with me). He said no, that he is just the parachute packer and helps fit people into their jumpsuits. He said that he will take people if something happens to the instructors, and that he has gone a few times (compared to the thousand that the instructors have gone). After we got suited up we headed out into the field for instruction. Then we hopped in the plane. There were 3 of us jumping, our instructors and our cameramen. We each hired a camera guy so we could get pics of the jump. My instructor still hadn't come. The low and behold, Uros comes out! I was freaking out! I wanted someone who had jumped more than a few times since they were the ones in charge of the parachute and the landing! Ahhh.... I was trying not to freak. We were all crammed into a little cockpit. As we rose the view was awesome. We were above the mountains and the clouds. When we reached 12,000 ft. The door opened. Meg and her instructor leaned out the door and were gone. It was my turn. Just me and good ole' Uros! He told me to scoot near the door. I was sitting with my legs hanging out. My photographer was hanging on to the wing and told me to smile. Yeah, smile while I am hanging 12,000 ft. out of a plane. Then Uros, who was strapped behind me rocked backwards and forwards and we were out! It was nuts! My feet were up to the sky and we flipped a few times. Then we turned so I was looking out ahead. Because the air is pushing up on you, you sort of feel like you are floating. It was scary! The view was amazing! Lakes, mountains, and sheep pastures. We were free-falling for 45 seconds, then the parachute opened and it was another 5 minutes before we touched down. During that time Uros, asked if I wanted to spin. I said, "why not" so we did. He spun all around and it was so cool, all though I was nervous that my lunch would come up! When we hit the ground I was so pumped! I did it!!!! And that's when I found out that Uros is a jokester. He had done over 10, 500 jumps! Phew! haha. I was a great experience and I would do it all over again. Who wants to join me!

The South Island details

So, here we go, bare with me on this long one.
Thursday: Last day of school, left Waihi at 4:30 and drove the 8 hours to Wellington. There we spent the night in the back of the van in the ferry parking lot.
Friday: We took the 3 hour ferry ride from the North Island to the South Island. The scenery was amazing and the wind was cold! We arrived in Picton and drove further down to Kaikoura. On the way we stopped at an awesome beach for lunch and then saw tons of seals along the rocks. There were tons of seal pups playing around. I loved this little town. The weather was good and we looked around town before camping for the night.
Saturday: We went whale watching! It was soooo cool. We saw two different sperm whales. You can't see much of them, just a bit of their backs and blowhole. When they dive down again, you can see their tale. That was amazing. We also saw some albatross and 200 dusky dolphins. These dolphins are the smallest in the world and were so fun to watch. They would swim right up to the boat and dive and jump all over. We then headed off to Hanmer Springs. We went to the Springs spa and enjoyed a few of the dozen outdoor hot pools. It was nice to do on a cool day. Then we went to a fun maze. We had to find clues in the maze to spell out a little message. From here we drove on to Christchurch where we camped for the night.
Sunday: Easter! We went to church at the Christchurch Cathedral. It was huge and gorgeous. It was cool to see an old church in the middle of town square. Most the shops were closed so we just browsed around town a bit. Then we went to the Antarctic Centre. We saw the blue penguin, the world's smallest. We watched them get fed. That night we stayed with our host parents kids and their family.
Monday: We went up to a cool lookout of town and then to the town centre where we walked around the arts center. It was soooo awesome. It is like 3 blocks of an old campus. There are art stores, theatres, movie theatres, and galleries throughout the whole thing. There are people performing on the streets too. Then we went on the Mount Cook. The drive took about 5 hours to see NZ's tallest mountain. We spent the night in the van at a campground there with the snow covered mountains and a lake all around us.
Tuesday: We did a two hour hike by the mount. It was again a gorgeous site.We headed out and drove to Dunedin. This town was awesome. It is a little bigger than Duluth and had a cool town centre. We stayed in a hostel that night. It was like an old big house and you rent a room for like 20 NZ$ and there are 4 people per room. There was a big kitchen, pool table and tv room. It was nice to sleep in a bed for once instead of a van. We walked to the city at night and went to a piano bar and a few other hangouts. It was really quite in town because it is the holidays so all the students are gone.
Wednesday we went to the Cadbury chocolate factory. You know the cadbury bunny? Yeah, I saw him in real life! haha. It was a cool tour. The place is huge and employs like 600 people. Then we went to the only castle in NZ. That was awesome too. It isn't huge, but it is beautiful. After that we saw the steepest city in the world, and i hiked it. In the evening, it was off to a brewery tour which was also pretty cool. After all of this, we drove to a beach and parked the van on the side of the road to sleep.
Thursday: We got up early in the morning and saw some seals on the rocks by a cool old lighthouse. We could hear all this grunting and realized it was a mother seal and her pups playing in a cove. We then drove to Te Anau and walked around town and stayed in a great holiday park for the night. It had fireplaces and was log-cabin style. Which was nice and warm since it was really cold outside. We even watched Grey's Anatomy in the TV lounge, before climbing into our cold van again for the night.
Friday: We went on a cruise through Milfrod Sound! It was the most spectacular thing ever! The drive took about 2 hours. Te Anau is the closest town. The whole Fiordland Park is all natural and huge! The are steep green cliffs and mountains everywhere. The cruise was a 3 hour boat tour from the beginning of the Sound to the Tasman Sea. It was freezing, even snowed and hailed, but while we were on the boat the sun was shining and everything was beautiful! We even saw seals and a pod of bottlenose dolphins. Last night we drove into Queenstown. We have taken it easy here so far, since tomorrow is a big day! We are skydiving! I will definitely update after all that excitement. Well that is all for now! More later if I survive!

South Island is AMAZING!

This is a quick blog for ya. Megs and I are in the South Island and it is so amazingly awesome. We have whale watched, hiked by the mountains, been to a castle, gone on a chocolate factory and brew house tour, cruised through Milford Sound and more. It truely is the most beautiful place I have ever been to. But I have five more minutes left on the internet here at the campsite. So farewell to all and there will be more to come. Check out the pics! Cheers!

Good times in Rotorua

Rotorua was cool. It was a very touristy town, but there was lots to do. We went to see some boiling mud pools in a park, went to the Historic Bathhouse, which is the Rotorua museum and the government gardens there. But by far, the coolest thing we did was zorbing! It is pretty much rolling people down a hill in padded gerbil balls. Megs and I went in a hydro one together. We climbed in the ball where there was a small pool of warm water inside and then we roll down the hill in it. We were soaked by the end. It was the funnest 30 seconds of my life! We also saw a Maori concert. So awesome. We stayed in a thermal camp park that night and woke up to have the thermal pools all to our selves for the morning. Very relaxing!

That's Right...I'm a Hiker!

Since Megan and I lacked in adventure last weekend, we decided to make up for it this past one. We packed our gear and headed off towards Taupo (about a three hour drive). We nestled into our van upon arrival in Taupo to get a good nights rest. The next morning we walked around our campsite to see the wonderful array of animals it offered. There were chickens, parakeets, peacocks, ducks, llamas, and a sheep. After that we headed off towards the city centre of Taupo. We booked a tour of Lake Taupo, NZ's biggest lake, on a sailboat called the "Barbary." The sailboat cruise was about 2.5 hours long. We sailed past some awesome Maori rock carvings (the real purpose of the trip was to see these). It was the most gorgeous day! Then we hit some of the shops and got some lunch. Next we headed towards Huka Falls, which weren't very big, more like rapids, but the color was cool. It was very a really light turquoise. We once again boarded our van and drove on to Turangi. That night we stayed at a sweet campsite. It was $6 a piece to stay there. We could even book an hour in the spa rooms. So Megs and I took a nice relaxing hot tub before getting ready for the big day ahead. Sunday morning we awoke at 6 am to begin our greatest adventure yet. We did the Tongariro Crossing, 8 hour hike! It was a hard climb, but well worth it. On the bus on the way to the start of the trail our driver said to be very careful of the poisonous gas in the volcanoe crevaces, as well as for falling rocks, because three people had to be helicoptered off the crossing the day before. A little nervous, we ventured on. We hiked up towards a volcanoe, Mt. Doom, from Lord of the Rings. We then hiked through two craters, saw Emerald Lakes, hot springs, and about 5 hours later, began the descent that over looked Turangi and Lake Taupo. It was just what you would imagine New Zealand to look like. It was gorgeous! We were pretty sore after all that, but to say we did it feels pretty good.
Yesterday, we arrived at school, excited to tell everyone about our accomplishment. One teacher said she couldn't believe we actually came to school after the hike! Other people said we were really lucky to still be in good shape and not injured! Made me feel like an adventurous rock star. It really did!

Year 7 Camp

This past week I went to Totora Springs Camp with my year 7 kids (10-11 year olds). It was a blast. The kids had different stations to go to throughout the day. I was in charge of damper cooking. Cool, I thought. What the heck is damper? Well, I was in charge of building a fire with the kids and then they cooked the damper, which is like a scone mix that you mix with water, put on a stick and cook in the fire. The first day was...well....a learning experience. It rained most of the day, so the fire building was a little sketchy and I wasn't sure what the damper was supposed to look like, so that didn't go so great. But the second day I got the hang of it and it was much better! I also got to go to some of the stations and do the activities with the kids. I did the low ropes course, the flying fox (zip line through the trees), abseiling (repelling down a wall), and shooting. The second afternoon the kids got to use the hydro-slide. It is the second biggest water slide in the southern hemisphere. I went down it 4 times with the kids. I have never been so bruised and sore! It was wild. We even sent one parent who went down the slide to the hospital for stitches!
That night we had a dance with the kids. It was hilarious hearing them belt out to Kelly Clarkson with their little accents! Over all, I had a blast with the kids!

Waitomo and Hamilton

Saturday, Megs and I went to Waitomo. It is pretty much a nothing town except that
it is set on top of a ton of interconnecting caves. It is now a huge tourist attraction,
because inside the caves are glow worms. Megs and I decided to go and check it all out. We signed up for the Black Labyrinth tour. It was a 3 hour tour where we tube through the water in the caves! It was awesome! Not anything really wild, but it was a blast! We got there at 9:30 and were put on the 2:15 tour, so we had a little time to kill, so we went
to the cave museum, then to the Kiwi House, where we saw tons of cool birds and including Kiwi Birds. You can only see them now pretty much in sanctuaries. There were two of them. They are huge. I always thought they were little birds. They are so weird looking!

After that we had lunch and went to the Shearing Shed, where they shear Angora Rabbits daily and you can watch a shearing show with free admission. A women commentates the whole thing too! Hahaha. So we watched a rabbit get shorn! How random is that?!

Then it was time to go back for the cave tubing. We had to wear helmets with headlamps,
wetsuits, and boots. We went through practice safety regulations and stuff. Then we
went down into the cave. There are stalagmites and stalactites everywhere. It was really
cool. We walked through some and tubed through other parts. We also came to a part where there was a "waterfall" it was like maybe 4 feet, so we had to stand up, turn around with our tube on our butt and jump backwards down it. This is where we saw an eel. It was just a baby, they called her Lily. She is usually in the same spot under a rock I guess. Then we connected tubes with our group of 12 and our guides and turned our lamps off. Our guides pulled us through the caves in complete darkness, and when you look up you can see all these bluish green shiny dots above you. These were the glow worms. Then we disconnected our tubes, turned the headlamps off and had to find our way through the rest of the cave by using the glow worms above us as a guide. The guides said it was better to turn our lamps off not only to see the worms, but so we didn't see the other eels either. Apparently Lily's grandparents are in that part of the cave. They are over 3 feet long!!!!! AHHHH. It was so fun. Then we got hot showers afterwards, because the water was freezing, and free soup and bagels. After the caves we drove to Hamilton, a big city, and camped there for the night. We even treated ourselves to Pizza Hut!
Yesterday, we went to the Hamilton Gardens. They are huge!!!! We probably saw less than half in 2.5 hours! They were themed gardens. There was the Greek Garden, the Chinese Garden, the Parisian Garden, and the Indian Garden. They were beautiful!!! It was amazing. Check out the pics on my website!

This week I am off to camp in the wild NZ bush with my Year 7 kiddies. I can’t wait!

Squash Game

I played squash last night and lived to tell about it! And I had a blast!!!!!!!!

Best Night Ever

So, Megan read in the newspaper that there was indoor lawn bowling Tuesday nights at a local church. It said "Everyone Welcome! Free for your first time." Megan did a lot of lawn bowling when she was in Australia and loved it. So we thought, why not, right? We arrived at the church to see a sea of gray hair. We obviously didn't know it was a senior citizen thing! The closest person in age to us was in his fifties. And he was younger than the rest by twenty years. We sort of stood in the doorway just looking around when a woman came up to us and said, "new young people!" Well, we were introduced to the whole lot and everyone came to shake our hands. They gave Megan and I instructions on how to play and watched us practice so they could give us pointers. Before the real games began, it was time for announcements. The first one was, "Thank you to Doris for the new kneeling pads for us, they are lovely," and everyone clapped. The next was "it's great to see some old familiar faces here and to see two new young ones." And again everyone clapped for Megan and I. Then we were put on teams. My team did pretty well. I was by far the worst one there, but they all clapped for me everytime I bowled and gave me pointers. It was so nice to meet some new friends and they want Megan and I to join their league. It was one of the funniest nights we have had here! Who knows, maybe we will!

Whangamata and a little game they call squash

This weekend Megs and I hit up Whangamata. It is a beach close to home. We did some shopping and then laid on the beach and body surfed all day! It was a blast! I felt a little guilty when I know that my friends and family back home are freezing their booties off, but I thought, "hey, might as well enjoy the beautiful beach here. I am doing it for them."
Last night Megan and I went to a young adult youth group through our church. It is for anyone ages 17-30. It was awesome. It is so nice to be meeting more people our age and to get involved in something other than school.
And speaking of getting involved, I was asked to join the teachers' Squast team. I said, "sure, I'll join....oh yeah, what is it?" Apparently it is like raquetball, which I have never played. All I was told was "bring good shoes, and protective eyewear, and your first game is Wednesday!" hmmm...so now I am wondering why I was so willing to say yes. For those of you who know me well, I am neither athletic or graceful. In fact I am one of they most accident prone people I know. So yes, I am going to be standing in an enclosed room for 15 minute increments while little balls are being served at my face. I will post pics of my welts and bruises soon. If I don't make it through the game, I miss and love you all.

Raglan and the Fat Cat

This week Megs and I headed off ot Raglan. It's about an hour and 45 minutes to the East of Waihi. We pulled into town and were amazed by the amount of people that were there. There was some reggae festival going on that weekend and there were tons of people hanging out in the streets. We went outside of town to hit the beach. There are supposed to be amazing surfer beaches in Raglan and we found one called Whale Bay. The beach was really rocky and not the kind of beach you would swim at, but there were quite a few surfers there. It was so cool to watch them. Then we went to the swimming beach and hung out there all day. It felt wonderful. It was gorgeous weather! That night Megan and I had fish-n'-chips for dinner and watched the sunset in a park looking over the Tasman Sea. There was also a juggling contest going on as well as a lot of random unicyclists! We then hopped in our trusty van and headed toward the beach to camp there for the night. The next day we did some shopping around Raglan and headed to Bridal Veil Falls. The falls were amazing! Check out the pics of it on my picture website. After that we headed through Hamilton (one of the bigger cities), did some shopping and went back to Waihi.
That night, Megan came flying over to Carolyn's house (my cooperating teacher). She found me there and said, "thank God your here!" I asked what was up and she told me that she had left her house doors open to air it out and a HUGE cat had wondered in. She tried scaring it out, but instead it hissed at her, ran all over the countertops and into her bedroom where it was now stuck under her bed! She said she had been poking at it for 2 hours! It was now like 9:30 p.m. I went over there and sure enough there was 2 huge green eyes under the bed. This cat was big and mean and did not want to move. Finally Kristy, my flatmate, and her brother Matt came to our rescue. The three of us girls lifted the bed up and Matt pushed it out with a mop. It ran out and finally outside. What an ending to a busy weekend!

Earthquake!

I experienced earthquake number 2 last night. Wasn't very big though. That's 2 in the one month I have been here! I can't believe it has already been a month!

Movie set

I forgot to mention this in the last blog. When Megan and I were in Coromandel this weekend we had really wanted to go to Cathedral Cove. When we were camping on Friday night, there was a sign at the campground that said Catherdral Cove closed Thurs. and Fri. for the fliming of Naria: Prince of Caspian! That is the sequel to Narnia: The lion, the witch, and the wardrobe. We got to go to the cove the day after filming, so that was cool. But it will be awesome to see the movie and say I was there the day after they filmed it!

Pictures

I switched my picture website so that it is the same as Megan's. We have the same pictures, so now we only have to download them once. Check em out!

This weekend Megan and I headed off to explore the Coromandel Penninsula. It was amazing. We left around 5ish on Friday and stopped at a campground on the beach for the weekend. We used trusty old Gerdie (we named our van) to sleep in. Megan's host family lets us use the van to travel and camp in on the weekends. It was great! Saturday we hit Cathedral Cove which is amazing! It is so weird to see so many postcards and pictures of a place and then to actually go there! Then we went to Hot Water Beach. You just dig a hole in the sand and there is hot, really hot, water under it. It was like a mini hot tub right on the ocean. After that we went to a bone carving shop. We carved our own bone necklaces. Then we hit the town of Coromandel to camp in Gerdie again for the night. Today we shopped around Coromandel, checked out a cool waterfall, went to an amazing butterfly garden and headed back! It was a great weekend! Well, it's back to school tomorrow for the first full week of real classes. The kids are back in uniforms and the actual class work begins!