Oooh boy... where do I even begin? I'm over a month behind on updating this blog and I have done so much in this time...
So last I had written about I was headed to Gisborne on the North Island. I caught up with three British blokes on the bus out there and we ended up staying at an old converted nunnery which was kind of cool. The bus ride was beautiful but the weather turned rainy as we got into Gisborne and I had to use some of my rain gear for the first time. I was planning on spending a few days in Gisborne but only spent a day and a half (and didn't get to see the sunrise on the beach as it was really cloudy). I ended up skipping over to Rotorua to check out the hot mud pools and Polynesian spa and then down to Taupo where I hung out for the day. It was kind of a backtrack on my part and didn't really work out so I ended up heading back to Rotorua from Taupo where I did a day tour out to Matamata and got to check out Hobbiton. The cool thing about Hobbiton is they are starting production sometime in early 2011 on the movie The Hobbit so all of the hobbit homes have been fixed up and have grass roofs and flowers on the door. It was really cool to see Bilbo's house and I even got to stand under the party tree. I would love to post photos on facebook but because they will begin filming soon, I had to sign a non-disclosure agreement.
I spent that night in Rotorua and had a great time meeting some of the river rafting guys that were staying in the same hostel as I was. Since Rotorua has such impressive geothermal activity (it smells extremely sulfur-y) the hostel had a natural hot tub which was great to relax in.
The next morning I was up early and on my way back through Hamilton and onto Raglan where I was planning on spending the entire week up until Christmas surfing and relaxing. The weather wasn't very great and was raining pretty much everyday but I met some really cool people at the hostel and every morning we'd grab a wetsuit and surf board and head out to the beach to catch some waves. It didn't matter if it was raining or not as we were wet anyway. I was planning on taking a surfing lesson but they give you some basic surf tips at the hostel and the others I was headed out with were learning as well so it was just kind of a team effort figuring out what to do. When I caught the bus out to Raglan I met a Portuguese guy named Diogo who had no money, little English, and nowhere to stay but he promised to teach me how to surf. He found me out in the surf and made me go out to the big waves (this was my first day surfing). Somehow I missed the memo that when learning, you should stay in the foamy surf and not try tackle the giant waves pro-surfers hit up. But I was up for the challenge and I did pretty well on the big waves. I was even standing up on my first day! At the end of it Diogo kept telling me "You crazy girl. You like big wave!" Haha... I had no idea! Regardless, the week of surfing was amazing aside from the nasty sunburn I received on a cloudy day across my nose. It blistered up and looked awful (and felt awful too). Thank goodness for giant bottles of aloe vera and hot sauna's to help sooth the pain.
Christmas Eve I left Raglan and headed back into Hamilton to catch a bus up to Auckland to meet up with the McAleese's who were kindly inviting me to spend Christmas with them. How funny that I would be spending Christmas in NZ with them while two of their daughters were spending Christmas in Canada with close family friends. They picked me up at the bus stop and we headed out to their friends place for a delightful German Christmas Eve meal.
This was an odd Christmas for me without any snow - it seems so strange to wear shorts and a tank top and be able to do activities outside and have BBQ's to celebrate it. (I must admit I actually really enjoyed it!) Christmas day we had an amazing dinner of lamb, ham, and turkey and an abundance of wine. Sue made the most amazing Christmas pudding for dessert and we visited with some of John's family until some more friends came over and we played Petanque and had another amazing meal for supper (over here they call it tea which just confuses me haha) and spent the evening exchanging gifts.
The next day was a pretty awesome day spent at the Ellerslie Horse races. I've never been to horse races before but you get to get all dressed up and wear fancy hats and sit and drink and eat while betting on horses. I ended up betting on a few and at the end of the day came out about 10$ ahead (not a lot but I definitely wasn't complaining). The next day Sue & John took me around Auckland and showed me some of the sights. We headed up to Mount Eden and One Tree Hill where you get a fabulous view of the city. Part of Auckland is an isthmus that's only 16km across so you can see both bodies of water on either side of it (and walk all the way across Auckland if you were motivated). We stopped at a pub for some chips and beer (I love the dark beer here) and then headed across the Auckland Bridge and checked out the million dollar yachts in the marina. We stopped and picked Hayden up from home and then headed out to Piha to check out the amazing surfing beach there and eat some ice cream.
The next day I was leaving Auckland on the Kiwi Experience bus tour for the next month or so....
