And for everyone biting their nails while waiting for my
next post I apologize. Much has
happened since I last wrote almost 2 months ago. Highlights include; a trip to the glorious Bay of Islands
north of Auckland, a weekend of strep throat and missing the only playoff game
in our Sunday soccer league, the Arcadia program’s farewell dinner and later
that night my 21st birthday celebration, and a week guiding my
mother and aunt Joan to my favorite places on the South Island. Currently I’m sitting in the Auckland
airport after having missed my 6 AM flight this morning to watch the
Italy-Croatia soccer game after seeing mom and Joan off to their flight back
home. I misremembered the time of
my departure and thus had to book another flight 6 hours later, but I digress,
as I have more interesting things to talk about.
After returning home after my 18-day travel-bender touring
the South Island, I was quite happy to return to Wellington. It was great to see all my friends and
I was surprised to feel at home upon my return. The days quickly turned into weeks and soon several friends
and I were on a red-eye bus north to Auckland on a Friday night. Here we had our first casualty as one
of my friends booked the wrong bus and thus didn’t have a ticket, so we were
6/7. We arrived at 5 AM Saturday
morning, spent some quality time at Denny’s until the car rental shop opened at
9, and finally were back on the road.
We drove north up the coast, past the Bay of Islands to Peninsula where we spend a grand
afternoon on the beach, tip-toeing over sharp rocks to see sunset, and drinking
Tui’s and Teacher’s whiskey in a tree.
That night we evaded discovery and pitched camp high up in the bush on a
bluff overlooking the beach. We
struggled to gather enough wood for a small fire but soon were warm and
content. The next morning we drove
back south to Pahia, kayaked around the bay in a torrential downpour, dried off
and warmed up over coffee’s and live music, and later drove back to Auckland. We crashed at a friend’s friend’s flat,
and the next morning had to catch the bus again back home at 9. Unfortunately this time we were only
3/6 on catching the bus (due to inebriated debauchery the previous night). The stragglers made it back to welly
the next day and all was well.
Several more weeks passed until I had the great misfortune
of spreading myself too thin. One
Saturday night I came down with a minor sore throat, and the next morning when
I awoke I knew it was bad. I had
strep for 3 days but thanks to excellent foresight on the part of my mom I had
brought along antibiotics and was able to kick it by that Wednesday. Unfortunately I missed our first (and
only it turned out) playoff game in our Sunday indoor soccer league as we lost
on the last play of the game.
Needless to say I was pretty gutted.
Before I knew it we were in our final week of classes and my
birthday was rapidly approaching.
Wednesday night the Arcadia group donned our Sunday Best and all met at
a very nice restaurant downtown on the waterfront. Unfortunately it was a beautiful Wellington night, full with
gale force winds and driving, biting rain. We met Jane and Alex for one last time and enjoyed a lovely
evening with great food. During
dessert I was pleasantly surprised when everyone broke into song (Happy
Birthday) and our server brought out a small cake for me. Never before have I had trick candles
before but I actually had to pluck them out while still on fire and douse them
in my glass of water to put them out.
Afterwards some of us went to a bar for some live music where we stayed
until I turned legal (in the US anyway).
After bar hopping for a while (still raining and windy as hell) I was
convinced to jump in the harbor. I
actually didn’t have much of a choice but thankfully I have brave friends and
there were several of us who took the plunge. Mildly hypothermic, we did the best we could to dry off and
ran to the nearest dairy where we called cabs and warmed up. All in all it was an awesome night and
a good time was had by all.
Two days later, Friday night, my mother and aunt flew into
Wellington. The next day I showed
them some of my favorite places in Wellington; Zelandia (a bird and wildlife
sanctuary a short walk out of town), the ever-popular Botanical Gardens, and
the impressive national museum Te Papa. Sunday we
flew to Queenstown and met Jane for coffee and walked around. The following day we picked up our
rental car, drove north to Glenorchy, and spent the day hiking up the Dart
Valley. We returned to Queenstown
that night and the delicious and famous Ferg Burger for dinner. The next two days we spent in nearby
Wanaka, hiking, exploring, and relaxing.
One day mom and I drove 2 hours on a dirt road to a hike we had wanted
to try. On the way we passed
hundreds of sheep and cows.
Although we passed no other cars we experienced our first sheep-jam,
honking the horn through a kilometer of sheep who blocked the road. Thursday we returned to Queenstown to
hop a plane to Auckland, and now here I am, stuck in an airport once again.
Time has flown these last few months and it will be less
than 3 weeks until I am back in the US.
Before I leave I have 2 final exams to pass and much more adventure to
be had, so stay tuned because there is more to come!
