auckland is a great city and really multicultural, definitely different from boston when it comes to diversity. people here are also very friendly, random people say hi to you on the street and everyone is always willing to help you out or just chat. the only thing is, cities are cities and besides the diversity, the niceness, and the fact that drivers are absolutely insane and on the left side of the roads, walking on the streets and between skyscrapers gets kind of old. so that's why we've been traveling every single weekend since we got here. we have 16 hours of class squished in tue-thur and then fri-mon is the 4-day weekend until october, when we start our 32-hour a week internships/8 hour class on fridays. i've already started mine and i work 9 hours spread between tue-thur too. (explains the busy-ness).
the first weekend, our group had orientation and took a bus tour around the city and the west coast beaches. auckland has water on both sides of it so the coasts are really close. we went to the top of mt eden, the tallest dormant/extinct volcano in the middle of the city and from there, we could see the other ones that are spread out around the city, over 50 of them. we also saw mission bay and bastion point, 2 historical sites just outside of downtown. then finally we left the city and went a little bit out into the country to see the west coast blacksand beaches and have a wine tasting at a vineyard.
the next weekend, we went to northland, the peninsula north of auckland. i've never seen so many shades of green in my life, and when the coast sea is in the background and the sky is blue, the view is pretty breathtaking. we rented these vans called "spaceships" that are minivans by day and tents by night. pretty cool stuff. while we were in northland, we split up into smaller groups and mine decided to go "sand duning" aka sliding down probably a 60 degree steep sand dune, probably about 200 ft high on tiny plastic sleds. unfortunately, its as dangerous as it sounds and Raina, one of the girls with us, broke her ankle trying to stop before hitting the grass at the bottom of the hill. so we pretty much spent the rest of the weekend in a couple different hospitals. on the way to the 2nd one, we had to stop at Bay of Islands and since nothing was open for us to stay in that late, we slept on the side of the road next to the beach in our cars. quite an experience. beautiful sunrise though over the bay. we got to the 2nd hospital in whangerai (fang-ga-ray) and Raina ended up needing to get surgery so we played tourists around town while she got that. the trip ended up still being really fun and Raina took it like a champ and said she still had fun too despite the broken ankle.
last weekend, we took a road trip to waitomo and lake taupo. waitomo is this tiny, very hilly town a little off the main road but under all those hills are these labyrinths of glow worm caves. we took a 4 hour guided tour of a section where we had to wear wetsuits (it was freezing) and literally hiked, climbed, squeezed through crevices/tunnels, swam, and tubed through a route under the hills. when we turned the lights off of our helmets every so often and looked up, the ceilings of the caves were full of these glow worms and it really looked like green constellations. it was awesome. the next day was kind of a break day, we got to taupo and just visited a few waterfalls and boiling craters and finished off the day with a soak in these natural hot springs which were FREE. quality. we stayed in hostels both nights for cheap but they were really nice hostels. we left the next day but before we did, we did a little bit of jumping out of a plane at 12,000 ft. sky diving is probably the single most incredible thing i've ever done and there really are no words to describe it. just that i plan on doing it at least one more time before i leave here. probably helps that the landscape here is pretty incredible itself.
this past work week/work 3-days, was pretty rough on me since i had a paper due tue, a deadline for work on wed, and another paper due today (thur). i havent really slept or eaten a real meal for about 4 days now. but that's done now.
this weekend, we're going to rotorua as a program sponsored trip and staying in a Maori (the NZ indigenous people) marai (home land). theres also street luging, hot springs, and a little something called zorbing there--rolling down a big hill in a giant water filled air bubble/hampster ball. should be funny i think.
rotorua this weekend, the south island the weekend after, and the cook islands (tropical!) the week after that. sweet as (nz slang-means awesome, sweet, cool, etc...)
miss everyone and hope everythings great at home!
