Why Auckland?

SO Wellington was fun! After being so many other places in the country, I didn’t think there could be a place so different than everywhere else. But then there was Wellington.

The atmosphere is just so different than Auckland, the people are different, the style is different, the city is completely different. I must say I really did like it. We stayed in hostel near Cuba Street for the first few nights and we had a total blast. Especially on my birthday! 

We went to the ‘Trippy Tree’ in the Botanic Gardens. It’s this super cool tree that’s wicked tall and easy to climb, and the leaves at the top are so thick that you actually sit right on top of the tree. There was an awesome view of the city from the top, too. It was nighttime and my camera is pretty sub-par, but here’s a pic of Giselle almost at the top. 

We went to some good cafes and restaurants like Midnight Espresso, Sweet Mama’s Kitchen and Hashigo Zake. As if I wasn’t already obsessed with chai lattes before…

For the last few days we couchsurfed with some cool people in a town right out side the city, Newtown. We slept in an awesome mini room that was filled with mattresses, blankets and pillows. Which was totally essential due to the fact that it was colder in the house than outside! Damn New Zealanders not knowing what insulation is. They were pretty awesome people with a cool cat and cool stories. Needless to say, before now I’ve never pulled my boot out from under a couch with a giant weta on it. Then the cat killed it.

Wellington was awesome but super cold and windy! Made me miss home a little bit more… that fact that it will be summer in just a few weeks is just pure bliss! It does feel really weird that I only have three days left in New Zealand.

Weirdweirdweird.

Well a few of my friends have asked me what’s been going on lately and I guess here are my top 5 things:

1. I (finally) went to a rugby game! My first rugby game, actually. It was in Mt. Eden and it was the Warriors vs. the Storm. SADLY, those damn Aussies won. But I think our boys here in NZ put up a fair fight. The best part about it was that before the game started, a team of tiny little children had a scrimmage on the field! I’m talking 4 and 5 year olds dukin’ it out being all rough and tough. So cute, and mildly frightening. I guess they go hardcore at a young age down unda. 

2. I’m currently writing my last essay of the semester! T-minus a day until freedom until September. Tumblr= perfect procrastination.

3. I got a tattoo! Yep, I did it, and I’m more than happy with the result. I got a koru, which is a spiral shape based on the shape of a new, unfurling silver fern frond from NZ. It symbolizes new beginning, growth, strength and peace. I got two fronds swirling together, which also means interconnectedness. As far as the inside design goes, I looked at a bunch of Maori artwork and moko tattoos, and went with a design inspired by that. I drew up most of the design on the inside, with a few tweaks from my tattoo artist, Stef. I got it done at MaiTattoo in the downtown area. 

So… sorry for the bad quality image, a friend took this and I understand it’s not the clearest image of it but you get the idea. I’m currently refraining from uploading pictures anywhere else, because it’s placed on my upper outer thigh and well, you can basically see my undies/butt in every other picture haha. It was important to me to get it in a place that was easy to cover up. This will only be visible when I’m in a bikini! Even shorts will cover it. Yay me. More pics to come soon, most likely. 

Here’s the original jade necklace where I saw the double koru:

And here’s the silver fern from which it’s based off:

Needless to say, I’m pretty excited about it! However, my father is not. It’ll grow on him ;)

Not sure if anyone’s still out there, since it’s been some time since I posted, but I’m back in action. Not going to go into too much detail, but this past May has been one of the most difficult months of my life, suddenly losing three friends in a car accident. I’m trying to not let it define my experience here in New Zealand, but I do look at each day now with a different set of eyes. All of us students in the BU group here in Auckland have dealt with a lot lately, not to mention the friends and family back home. On a lighter note, we could not have better support anywhere else in the world than here with each other. We have definitely grown together.

In the past two weeks, nothing ‘adventurously notable’ has happened, but I did hop on a plane to Sydney for a week at the end of April.

Highlights of my Sydney trip:

-Seeing one of my best friends from BU, Sydney!

-Exploring the city and markets, and this yummy corn

-Swimming for hours with Giselle at Bondi Beach

-Swimming in the Ocean at 1 a.m. with a bunch of friends (ahem, not pictured)

-Patting a koala and kangaroo

-Hanging out with my dad’s cousin, Rich, who has lived in Australia for many years (also not pictured, by request of him.. so modest)

-Trying absinthe ‘the right way’ at the absinthe salon in Surry Hills

I definitely wish I had made it out to Melbourne but I’m pretty low on cash so just Sydney definitely sufficed. More next time.

So I haven’t updated for a while because I’ve basically been traveling for the ENTIRE month of April. It was nice.

Seth came to visit (!!!!!!) and we embarked on an epic road trip. We did so many things that paraphrasing will be the only thing keeping this post from being abnormally long and detailed, SO:

We went to Cormandel peninsula and I showed him the secret beaches I went to back in February, we were super lucky to get extremely nice weather. We climbed to the tippity top of the steep mountain overlooking the beach at New Chum’s.

We stopped in a beachy town on the way out of Coromandel the next morning called Tauranga. It was actually really cute! There were two amazing beaches and some really delicious places to eat. We had dinner at Mac’s and got a feast to share with grilled shrimp, mussels, sausages, lamb, beer-battered fries, salad and coleslaw. It was simply deeeeelicious.

Our next stop was a city called Rotorua. It’s know to be an adventure capital and boasts having TONS and tons of geothermal activity and a lot of opportunities to get right up close to it. We hiked through a geothermal valley and saw boiling lakes, hot geysers, blue pools and beautiful mountains. Then as we were driving back toward the city centre, we saw another geothermal walk and decided to that one as well. Except this was a little different because it was a tiny path in the back of a farm which ended up being awesome for two reasons: 1) there were wild grapes everywhere that I just devoured for hours and 2) we found a pig named Porky who belonged to the farm but just roamed the entire path with us!

Then he bit Seth’s foot. But we forgive him, he’ll be bacon soon anyway.

After we walked around town for a little bit, we kept seeing flyers for this animal/nature walk where you can PAT BABY LION CUBS. Yes you read that right. And yes I did pat THREE of them. And yes it was free. Well, we snuck in. So it was free for us :) They were beyond adorable, and I definitely never expected to pat lions in NZ but hey, I’m not complaining.

The next day we headed to Lake Taupo. We ended up parking the van at a hostel that night which was a pretty good deal because we not only got to use all the hostel’s facilities (bathroom, shower, kitchen, etc.) but we also go to utilize the awesome commonspace and in-house bar they had, which was amazingly cheap. And we were right in the heart of the town. We walked around the town a lot during our two-day stay, but also drove out around Taupo to kayak the Waikato River and see things like the gorgeous and ginormous Huka Falls. So blue (we were kayaking a bit upstream from the drop-off)!

Finally, it was time to drive down to Tongariro National Park to do what we were most excited about: the Tongariro Crossing, a 19 km walk across and amazing mountain chain south of Taupo. We left at 7 a.m. and started the hike at 7:30 on a brisk Tuesday morning. About two hours in, we saw a trail to our right that only about 20% of the crowd of people that started the hike actually went through with  – the trail to climb Mt. Doom! On the guide we had it said it was extremely dangerous and for experienced climbers only, but obviously we still did it. There was absolutely no trail up the side of the mountain and rocks and dirt/dust falling everywhere. Every step up was so difficult! About two hours later we finally reached the summit and well, it was definitely worth it.

The views were simply spectacular, and hey. I climbed Mt. Doom. The way down was not much easier… sliding, falling, and slipping everywhere on rocks. Sometimes I’d slip and fall for a while just sliding off the mouton. Got a couple scrapes but then it was finally complete! Then only six more hours to go until the end of the hike… let’s just say we were EXHAUSTED that night.

The next day we were still pretty much too tired to do anything extreme. But we did anyways. We drove up to Waitomo where there are a ton of really old caverns with staggering stalagtites and stalagmites. And so many glow worms (which are actually maggots with glowing shit. Nice.)! The caves were really cool but after we did the walking tour of the cave.. we figured we actually didn’t see quite enough of it, so why not go black water rafting through it?! We suited up in wetsuits, climbed our way through the forest, let ourselves in through the tiny mouth of the cave and jumped into the icy water in our trusty black tubes. We floated all throughout the caves, seeing glow worms and jumping off waterfalls BACKWARDS in the pitch black. No big deal.

It was actually so much fun. The very last night of our trip, we decided to start driving north toward Auckland again so we’d have some time to do something before returning the rental in the morning. But.. we drove too long and too late so there was absolutely nowhere we could stay.. and we had no gas left after taking a long turn after a really long, windy road to nowhere. So we just parked on a sketchy hill outside a farm in the middle of nowhere and could barely sleep with the thought of a scary, angry Kiwi farmer standing outside our van with a pitchfork and a sheep’s head.. luckily we survived.

Finally back in Auckland with the car we decided to get a delicious lunch in the cute little seaport town Devonport. Three words: mango, avocado, brie.

Well we had an amazing three weeks together and I miss Seth and our many adventures already! Two more months til I’m back in Boston…

Stay tuned for stories about my week in Sydney!

www.twitter.com/YHandGNZ

We’ve just started out, so stay tuned for upcoming decor tricks, DIY projects, delicious recipes and easy gardening tips!!

:)

In other news, not related to my trip at all, I started my internship yesterday at ACP Media. I’m not entirely excited about it, but I guess that’s just because my first day wasn’t exactly exciting. It was just office work. I had to update the stockist lists, which is every single designer, store, boutique, brand or name that’s mentioned in the magazine (I worked with Fashion Quarterly yesterday). So I sat there and wrote down the websites for tons of designers, some that I knew like Dior and Adidas, and some that I didn’t know like Cheetah and Cherry Cotton Candy. I did that for four straight hours and only got half-way through the “D’s”. At least there’s free tea and coffee… let’s hope things get more exciting! Actually I know I’m going to be constructing a website for Fashion Quarterly and a Twitter for Your Home & Garden. 

On the last day of our trip, we ventured pretty far north along the west coast to Greymouth. It was supposedly one of the biggest towns in the South Island… but it was pretty small and deserted. “Big” definitely has a different meaning there. Anyway, before we got the town we stopped to see a beautiful thing of nature – the pancake rocks! They’re right on the coast, and it’s a bunch of cliffs that look like little layers stacked on top of each other, it’s a pretty cool natural phenomenon and apparently geologists are still confused by it. 

The best part about it was the time we went, it was just before sunset. The sky was SO beautiful! I don’t think I’ve ever got pictures of the sky as good as these.. there’s so many so I could only pick a few.

So after a long eight days of traveling, it ended up being an awesome trip! Now I understand why New Zealanders always tell me that the South Island is better. There’s a lot of things I love about the North Island, but the South is just filled to the brim with so many natural beauties.. so it’s a tough competition. Hopefully I get to go back there when Seth visits, to explore Golden Bay and Nelson. We’ll see!

P.s. Check out this cute little guy we found in the mountains of Arthur’s Pass! It’s a kea :)

We stayed in Queenstown for four days, so during our stay there we decided to go on a day trip to Milford Sound. It was about a four hour drive out to the tipppity tip of the west coast. Milford Sound is a fjord (which is a narrow sort of inlet of water with steep cliffs surrounding it) that’s inside Fiordland National Park, and is definitely one of NZ’s top tourist destinations. I guess I’ll check that one off my list of touristy things.

We bought a pretty expensive ticket to get on a ferry that took us all around the sound, and took us right under huge waterfalls and went all the way out to the tip of the Tasman Sea. Even though it was pretty expensive, I think it was worth it. There were waterfalls everywhere! It was pretty cold and rainy and really windy once we got on the boat but it was still awesome. And there was complimentary tea and coffee. I think we each had at least 5 cups… that stuff’s a luxury when you’ve been eating rice and beans five nights in a row :)

We stayed there for pretty much the entire day, the drove back in the late afternoon. On the way back we stopped at a site called Mirror Lake, and it was pretty cool. The water was so clear that you could see the mountains pretty good in the river’s reflection. It probably would’ve looked better on a clearer day, though.

After spending a few days in Dunedin, we started our drive bright and early across the island headed toward Queenstown. It was a long five hour drive. But when we finally got there, it was a bright, warm, sunny day! The first thing we did there was climb the biggest, closest mountain we could see. It was about an hour hike, maybe 45 minutes, and when we got to the top it was the sweetest view ever!

Our hostel was a five minute walk from downtown where there were a bunch of shops and places to eat. The best burger in New Zealand, The Ferburger, was sitting there waiting for me. It was AWESOME. I got the Southern Swine, a huuuge burger with yummy sauce and guac and tons of toppings. The town is located right on a huge river which was so blue I think a new Crayola needs to be invented called “Lake Wakatipu”.

The shops were pretty sweet, but the whole town felt a bit touristy.. I guess that’s okay though since I’m actually a tourist. I bought a bunch of shot glasses for my friends at home (so if you’re reading this, chances are I got one for you :) The nightlife was also pretty sweet. The bars and clubs seemed to be a lot better than the ones in Auckland, but maybe it was just the cider… Also, I won a contest at a bar where I got a $200 bar tab and $100 cash. Let’s just say jager bombs alllll nighttttt longgggg. 

And hey look, we finally found Gollum!!!!!!!!

SO! It’s been far too long since I’ve updated, but I was on an 8-day long journey in the South Island! I’ll just update posts by place, since no one likes reading one suuuper long post :) Well our journey started out in Christchurch, because it was the cheapest to fly into, but there wasn’t much to see there since the earthquake pretty much devoured the entire city. We rented a sweet mini-van for the eight of us and started driving down the eastern coast. We drove for hours and stopped for lunch in Oataru, a really, reallly small mining town. It seemed pretty deserted, but there was a pretty sweet candy shoppe so I got chocolate coconut clusters. 

There was also a really sweet whiskey art gallery in an abandoned-looking building, check ittt.

And a broken down rusty train in the middle of town by the water…

When we finally arrived in the city of Dunedin, it was raining. And we were pretty tired by then so we just made rice and beans for dinner and attempted to go out, but the night life was a bit lame so we just went to bed. For the whole trip, we were on a tight budget, so we only booked four beds and doubled up the whole time. Luckily, in Dunedin, the people we were sharing a room with were chill, one of the guys was super old but made ramen with serious style.. like he put meat and eggs in it.. the real deal. The other three guys were younger and we actually ended up hanging out with two of them, one was from Denmark and the other from Chile. 

The next morning when we woke up it was rainy and gross again but we didn’t wanna waste our days so we drove out to Otago Peninsula. We ended up at this trail to the beach that was a pretty long walk but when we finally got there it was so worth it. We saw a TON of seals! And baby seals! And penguins, but they were really shy so we only saw them hiding from far away.

And on the walk back we saw something very strange in the sand.. it looked like a coat or a blanket.. it was white and furry.. and then I saw it.. AN EAR! It was a sheep! Half-buried in the sand.. still a mystery how it got there.

After that we climbed up a mountain and then we stood at the center of a volcanic vent! Yay!

And then… it was really rainy and slippery and the roads were super tiny and slicked wet… we turned a corner a bit too fast and this is what happened…

Kidding. This wasn’t us. Luckily ;)

This past weekend we went on a trip to the Northland (basically the northern part of the north island, how original). Our first stop was to this teeny tiny town where this guy chills on a dock in his boat FILLED with sandboards, and makes a small business of it. Well, this dude has the best idea ever because it was so so so much fun. 

When I first heard we were going sandboarding I was picturing one of those really thin flat little boards that people slide on the sand at the beach near the water and then run and jump on it… apparently sandboarding is actually just a boogie board with a a real flat, smooth bottom. And you don’t stand up on it, you go on your belly! When we got on the boat and started speeding toward the huge sand dunes, I couldn’t believe it! The dunes were humongous and all I could think about was getting on and sliding right off Wipe-out style. But nope, I was (somehow) a natural. 

We raced a bunch of times with everyone and some people were really good and flew right down into the water and some were really bad and kept falling off, it was funny to watch. I realized the best technique was to put the board at the edge of the dune and then get a good running head start and dive onto the board forcing it quickly down the dune.. much better than running with it and then going down. I would have stayed there all day if I could.

Suddenly Albert Park was filled to the brim with delicious Asian cuisine, bright colored lanterns and TONS of people. I’ve never seen that many people together at once in such a small place! It was super cool and all the lanterns were awesome and huge. I couldn’t get pictures of all of them there were waaay too many. 

I ate yummy pad thai and tried Kathy’s bbq squid which was pretty good… also we couldn’t resist getting melons with tropical ice cream in them :) 

For an essay I have to do in my sociology class, I have to compare two suburbs of Auckland so I decided to make my way out to an area that’s different than what I’m used to seeing everyday where I live. Glen Innes is an impoverished area and as soon as I got off the bus all I could see was op shops, the Salvation Army, and dollar stores (too bad most of them were closed). So it’s definitely not somewhere I would come to hang out all the time because there’s not much to do, but there are plenty of cheap, delicious bakeries!

I tried a meat pie, which I was told I had do to or wouldn’t be accepted by Kiwis, and I must say it wasn’t my favorite thing in the world… the chocolate crunchy cookie I got at the bakery later was way better. I think it’s because I thought by ‘Steak and pepper’ it meant steak and peppers… but it was just steak and black pepper, and A LOT of black pepper. Also the inside was pretty gooey.. Gotta try a new meat pie place. This is the only picture I took, I think it’s a pretty good one…

So I don’t know what exactly I was thinking when I made a $60 purchase to go to a music festival, but I did it anyway. And it was so worth it! We rented a huge ten-seater van and trekked it up north to Matakana to see some of NZ’s most popular and loved bands. On the way up… we decided to waste an hour’s worth of gas by completely missing the exit and having to do an insane backtrack… but at least it led us to a honey bee farm! I bought some really good multifloral honey that has been making my PB and banana sandwiches that much better.

When we finally arrived we tried parking on this hilly grass thing and almost died when the van was tipped at pretty much a 45-degree angle (gotcha again, Mom… it was grass! You can’t die on grass, right?) but then made it up safe and sound. The walk to the outside venue was through this little forested path which was awesome! The whole venue was built into a little hill so there were all different paths and levels in the grass. We got there around 2 p.m. And posted up in our spot on the grass allll day long until about 12:30 a.m. that night :)

Luckily I packed a bunch of PB & J (now a main food group) and snacks.. But I couldn’t help getting a few icy cold ones (the concert was sponsored by Tuborg beer). The music was mostly funk, rock, reggae, roots style and ome of the bands that played were Fly My Pretties, Little Bushmen, and Kora.

I would upload some of their songs but it already takes fifteen minutes to upload a pic (noticing my lag of updating nowadays?), so search them on Youtube!

P.s. Check out this guy’s sweet mullet. Wish I got a pic from the front.

I feel like since I’ve been here, I’ve been to the beach at least ten times. Actually.. probably more. Last week we decided to venture out to a new one instead of going to Mission Bay every time and after a 20 minute bus ride we ended up in the cute little town of Takapuna. 

The beach was definitely smaller than Mission Bay was was less crowded, so that was good. You can also rent surfboards and paddleboards! Definitely going to do that in the near future. I guess I was too busy beach-bumming so the only picture I got was of the empty carton of delicious Swedish ice cream Kyle and I split… yes we shared an entire tub of super creamy delicious (and freakin’ expensive, $12!) chocolate ice cream. Yum!