NEW ZEALAND

Last Monday was the start of Macquarie's 2 week semester break, and the first day of my friend Anne and my adventure to New Zealand for a week.

I am completely in love with New Zealand.

At 5:50am on Monday we caught a shuttle to the Sydney airport, and we flew with Emirates into Auckland. The flight in itself was awesome. It was only three hours long, but we had over 600 movies to choose from, games, TV shows, operas, pop music, even the classical sounds of New Zealand! Also, they served me a vegan meal, something I've never actually received on an flight, including my 13 hour flight from San Fransisco to Australia. From the Auckland airport we took a shuttle to the youth hostel we were staying at for the night. It was an 8 person dorm room, and when we opened the door the lights were off and somebody was sleeping (even though it was early afternoon), which was awkward. So we left to explore the city.

Auckland is full of scary mannequins in shop windows and Japanese restuarants. We ate vegetable tempura at one, then we went up into the Auckland sky tower which holds the title for the tallest tower in the southern hemisphere. There are panels in the tower where the normal floor in cut out and instead there is clear glass where you can see the road below. You can stand on them, and Anne and I did while pondering bungy jumping. Bungy jumping was invented in New Zealand and we had been considering doing it, but the fact that just standing on those panels terrified both of us made us rethink this plan (also we were both on major budgets). But we stayed up in the tower basically until in closed (seeing as although Auckland is a major New Zealand city, everything closes early, and we wanted to avoid awkward hostel encounters). We had deep philosophical conversations. Sort of. Anne's an English major which I like, because most of my friends at Hampshire are more interested in media/film and I don't have many writer friends, so we talked about writing for a while, too.We got back to the hostel a little before 11, and now five people were sleeping and so we joined them.

The next morning we started our trip with Stray, the bus that would, over the course of 5 days, take us all around the North island.

Our driver, Natalie ("Nat") introduced herself and drove us up a big hill to a look out point where we would supposedly be able to see some big Auckland sights such as the famous One Tree Hill (not Chad Michael Murray related, although, actually, the show was named after the U2 song which was inspired by actual location in Auckland). Unfortunately, after driving all the way up to the look out point, all we could see was fog, which although disappointing, was sort of funny, and Natalie made jokes about it.

We then drove to Thames for a grocery store shop on the way to Hahai. We all checked into the hostel and had the option of going sea kayaking or taking a scenic walk to Cathedral Cove. Anne and I went with the free one. The walk was very beautiful and we stopped every 3 seconds or so to take pictures. We were told some scenes of Prince Caspian were filmed at Cathedral Cove, but I've haven't actually seen the movie...

After the walk I took a quick nap then it was time for dinner, a "real kiwi BBQ". (with vegetarian options!) Natalie cooked us sausages, veggie patties, and hash browns, along with serving salad and chips with pineapple crisp and custard for dessert. Anne and I talked to a guy named Alex from England. He has been traveling through and around Australia for the past several months, working when he needs to. (As the week went by I realized that most of the people on the bus were 20-something year olds in similar situations, wanting to see the world on a budget. The more I talked to them, the more I want to backpack through Europe, explore Asia, see EVERYTHING.)

After dinner Natalie drove us to the famous Hot Water Beach. She said we would be able to dig holes and make our own hot tubs. I had no idea what she was talking about. She parked the bus and we started walking across the beach, shovels in hand. It was pitch black outside, and I looked up at the sky and all you could see were stars, everywhere. I've never seen the night sky so vast and beautiful. It was overwhelming. I began banging into people as I tried to walk while staring up at the sky (not to mention the fact that, besides the one or two people with flashlights, nobody could see where they were going, anyway.)

After about a five minute walk we came across a giant hole somebody had obviously dug earlier. People began dipping their feet in the water, remarking on it wonderfulness, and eventually stripping off their clothes and soaking in the hole. Anne and I joined them, and soon there were a dozen or so of us, sitting in this hot tub hole, staring up at the beautiful sky. I couldn't stop giggling, I was so amazed at the random wonderfulness of that experience.

The next day Natalie offered us the ($85) option of going surfing, which everybody declined, and so most of the day was spend traveling in the bus, stopping at random locations such as the site of the giant L+P bottle (L+P being a big drink in New Zealand. Its slogan is 'World Famous in New Zealand since ages ago' and it is sold in most stores). Mostly everybody in the bus, myself included, was more interested in the public bathrooms next to the giant bottle, however. They included lots of silver buttons and a talking voice that, once you locked the door said "Your maximum time is 10 minutes. After 10 minutes the door will unlock. You have 10 minutesremaining." Then elevator music played. We spent at least half an hour there as everybody wanted to explore the talking toliets.

Eventually we got to the hostel we were staying at that night, and it was a super cool one in the middle of the "bush" with bush walks, a free flying fox which me and Anne ran to immediately, and an evil ropes course which me and Anne didn't really understand how to do as there was nobody there, and we both ended up falling off and getting slightly beat up by the ropes. We went for a bushwalk, and to the hostel's look out point where they said we'd be able to get a really nice view of the sunset. Alas, it was much too cloudy that night.

The next day was our most jam packed. It started with a drive to Waitomo, a town the boasts a population of 41, to explore the caves. While some people went abseiling and black water rafting, Anne and I chose a cheaper, mellower trip, and soon we were in a van with our tour guide, a very friendly man named Norm who insisted that everybody in his van introduce themselves (including the children) and tell about any personal problems. "Free therapy!" he said, chuckling. The drive was very scenic and we got to see many sheep and hills. Then we got out of the van, put on helmets with flashlights, and walked into the first cave, where we got on a raft and were told to turn our flashlights off. Then very slowly we glided down the cave, thousands of greenish glowworm dots above us. (Did you know that glowworms are actually cannibalistic maggots, the glow of which comes from their snot and poo? sweet, huh?) After leaving the first cave Norm skillfully served us tea, coffee, hot chocolate, and biscuits (which is NZ speak for 'cookies') before going into the second cave.

After the caving Anne and I went ZORBING. Yes, yes - we rolled down a hill in a giant plastic ball! It was a true New Zealand experience. And it was amazing. Because we didn't have our bathing suits (they were in the trailer in our luggage) we had to buy the OFFICIAL ZORBING GEAR PACKAGE. And so, if I ever go zorbing again, I am ready. With my official zorbing t-shirt, shorts, towel, and matching bag.

Afterwards we headed to Maketu to our accomodation for that night, with local Maori. We were served a 'Hangi' meal and got to see a cultural show. Afterwards, the boys and girls were split up, and while the four boys on the bus learned the battle chant (I forget the name of it), the girls learned how to poi (although, due to my complete lack of hand eye coordination, I was awful at this. We then had to perform in front of each other!

That night we all had mattresses in the room where the show had been held. Anne and I stayed up talking to some of the other backpackers on the trip. We all compared drinking/smoking/sexual consent ages in our countries and talked about where else in the world we had traveled too. Then we got on the topic of cereal. I am a HUGE cereal fan. But, I'm talking sugary cereals. Cap'n Crunch, Reese's Puffs, Cookie Crisp, Honeycomb - I love it all. But when I confessed this to the group they all laughed at me. Apparently cereal is a total U.S. thing. There barely exists cereal besides corn flakes and granola in at least any of the countries represented by the people in the group I was talking with (namely, Denmark, Ireland, and England). And in Australia the only sugary cereal I was able to find was Froot Loops, and I couldn't even find that in New Zealand. (Also, I set up a bank account here and one of my security questions involves my favorite food being cereal and once I had to call the help desk because I was having problems and the lady at the bank read me the questions and laughed when I answered that one, saying, "Well, that's a new one!")

ANYWAYS, eventually we went to sleep and were awakened when Uncle Boy (the chief and owner of the house) blasted ABBA at 7 A.M. Yes, Dancing Queen and Mamma Mia in the wee morning hours...it was pretty ridiculous. He later confessed that ABBA was his favorite and he only listened to them.

As we packed our things on the bus, Natalie said, "Now, everybody, make sure you have EVERYTHING, as people always forget things here and it's hard to get them back if you forget something." She reminded us of this multiple times, really emphasized it. When we finally got going, about 4 minutes into the ride her phone rang, and she answered it saying, with attitude, "What did they forget this time!?" There was a pause, and then she looked back at us and said, "It was me!" and we all laughed, and it was such a sitcom moment.

We explore Rotorua, a geothermal area, very smelly but interesting. We did some shopping and ate lunch at a Thai restaurant. Then we headed to Taupo, and walked around there for a bit. It was a pretty easygoing day. Later that night a lot of the bus got drunk at the bar that was part of the hostel. I had one drink, a heavily advertised, very cheap "James' love potion". It was passionfruit mixed with vodka and as the bartender poured it he said, "FINALLY I've been trying to get rid of this stuff all night" and I was like, "hmmm." But it wasn't terrible. Some people went skydiving, and one guy bought the DVD, and we all gathered in the TV room to watch. It was very funny, and I was very jealous I didn't have enough money to go. I'm determined to go skydiving at some point in my life though.

That night was Anne and my last night with the group, as we were taking a bus back to Auckland the next day. We said our goodbyes, which was kind of sad, and the next day we had a wonderful (ha!) 4+ hour ride back to Auckland.

We bought a kumara, a big vegetable in New Zealand. It tasted like a sweet potato, and I liked it. Then we went to Minus 5, a bar completely made of ice, including the cups the drinks are in. That was fun. The next day, our last day, we took it easy for the most part. We didn't want to spend much money, so we walked around the city taking pictures of the bizarro mannequins and puns (puns are HUGE in New Zealand. From stores in alleys called "Right up your alley" to pretty much every advertisement I saw while there). We also hung out in a library for a couple hours. I read teen magazines. One of them was a specifically New Zealand teen magazines, which I found especially interesting because they interviewed American celebrities and asked them questions such as "Have you ever been to New Zealand?" (for which almost all answered "No, but I would love to go someday!") We ate a Burger Fuel, a big burger joint in New Zealand which I LOVED (vegan options, kumara fries, and soymilk shakes! i got a burger called "Tofu Combustion" For serious!) We ended up staying up all night as our flight was at 6:25, and they said we needed to be at the airport 3 hours early. And so our last few hours were spend having very sleepy conversations about past relationships and a trek to a 24 hour McDonalds for apple pies (which I've decided taste better in NZ than in Australia or the U.S.).