Final Moments in New Zealand

Hey everyone! Well here it is, the ending of my semester abroad in Auckland, New Zealand. I've choose a few pictures for the last week or so to show all the good times and goodbyes.

To begin, my absolute favorite picture. It literally just describes New Zealand perfectly- rainy, Auckland is a big city, water, and sheep- sheep everywhere. I took this on top of One Tree Hill in Auckland.

Here is Sarah, a family friend, and I outside the Auckland museum. It's one of the best museums I've ever been in. Each room has a different theme that it talks about and is all decorated to seem like you are in that thing (for example there was a volcano room so there was a giant volcano in the middle of the room).

My flat mates birthday, Elli, was just before Halloween so we all went down to the pub with pink birthday hats it was pretty embarrassing. That's her boyfriend Tobi with her who is visiting right now for a few weeks!

I got to stop and smell the roses :) There was a rose festival in Parnell that I got to go to with Sarah and a few of her friends. Sadly, it was raining so we had our picnic under the canopy of a connivence store, it was so funny. But the weather cleared up a bit for us to enjoy the festival.

Our second to last dinner together! Hitomi, Elli, Tobi, and I at the New York pizza place down the road (it sorta did taste like NY pizza!).

A surprise birthday party for my friend Pablo in Mission Bay (a local beach) with a whole bbq and fun! There was a lot of relaxing, eating, enjoying company, running around, and learning how to play the ukelele. Soooo if you love me a lot and want to buy me a ukelele like this one I'll play you a song! A friend taught me a few things on it and I just really enjoyed messing around!

Part of the whanau (family) being crazy on the beach!

It's been a crazy last month and a half, a lot a really great memories have been made. I'm nervous to leave behind the family I have made here but I know that where ever I go I'll meet new people and make a new family, I have a lot to look forward to in the next month.

My plan is to have 10 days in Australia (5 days in Melbourne, 5 days in Sydney) and then 20 days all over Europe. I'll be staying with friends throughout Europe and having them show me around so it should be a good time! I'll try to keep everyone updated as much as possible but I have a feeling it might be a bit hard, so bare with me!

Please email me and tell me how you all are doing I can't wait to come home and see everyone! 

Love and miss you all,

Michele

Tongariro Alpine Crossing Oct 26-27

Hello everyone!! Guess what!? This post is finally not about my south island trip, I thought I would never finish tell you about it! Well actually be prepared to hear more when I get home, it was such a good trip! After I got back I had quite a lot of work to do. I had to finish all of my finals and it was pretty rough but I got it done! So then it was time for the adventures to begin again. I was off to the Tongariro Crossing with a bunch of friends.

And this was our sweet ride. It's the nicest mini van rental in the world. Automatic doors, stereo system,  and it just looks really nice! We drove about 4 hours down to the national park and got there at about midnight then proceeded to cook dinner. Needless to say, it was a pretty late night and a very early start.

Here was our first glimpse of Mt Ngauruhoe (or for Lord of the Ring fans- Mt Doom). 

And here it is, the extremely long hike we were about the endure! Our plan was to finish the whole crossing in addition to making one of the two summits. We figured out it would take about 10 hours.

I decided my mission for the trip was to carry around this stick I found for the whole hike. And on the way I picked up some trash I found! A pretty cool hobby, I know. 

Our little hiking team!

LET IT SNOW!!!! It was so crazy that there was still snow. We got to have a good snow ball flight and everything!

After about 3 hours we came to the crazy summit. As a team we decided to attempt to summit Mt Ngauruhoe. It was the craziest crazy thing I've ever done in my life. It's an old volcano so it's just ash and rocks, literally you are climbing the side of a mountain. As you can see we were crawling up! I was enjoying the good work out until I would look to the sides once we were half way up. I had never felt like I could just fly off the side of a mountain before since there are always trails and trees. But if you slipped a bit you could just fall down the whole mountain- SO SCARY. Then the wind picked up and the clouds were moving in, then it became extremely windy. Everyone was extremely encouraging, which was great. A third of the group stopped half way up, another third had already made it to the summit and the middle group that I was in was team working up the mountain. At one point, my friend did start to slip and I had to catch her foot and hold there until we were regrouped. Basically, I'm pretty sure I was climbing Mt Everest.

About 5/6 up to the summit I got really scared of the wind, falling off a mountain, large rocks tumbling down the side of the mountain (they actually were at this point) so I needed to stop. I pushed myself pretty far I thought since I had been scared for a while. This is my little safe keeping rocks! I positioned myself behind two tiny rocks to block the wind. There was a bigger rock little enclosure about 50 feet below me but I was too scared to go down alone. And here I waited probably 40 minutes for people to make it to the top and come back to where I was to help me back down.

But here is the amazing view I got to see. I don't think I have ever been that high up while hiking, and if I have I've never had that sorta climbing hike before.

Eventually, people came back down and my friend Manuel held my hand and helped me down the rest of the mountain. He really is my savior! When we got to s certain part down it was pretty fun because you could just dig your heels in and jump down. But up until that point it was the scariest thing of my life.

When we all got to the bottom we decided to go back the way we had come since it was getting really late and we knew that route wasn't too hard. All of our legs barely worked though, there was a lot of grunts of pain when we had to step down. 

In the end, I'm so happy I went on this trip I really pushed my limits and tried something totally different and amazing!

Hope you find something that is terrifying to you this weekend and go out and do it! If you believe in yourself you can!

Love and miss you all,

Michele

Christchurch Oct 13

Hi everyone! After my last night in the south island the bus went to Christchurch. As you may remember Christchurch got hit with a really bad earthquake in February 2011, which they are still recovering from. A guy I barely knew from the bus was on the same flight with me so we decided to travel together into the city to see the damage. It was pouring rain, which made everything look even more sad. But here are a couple pictures of just the distaster that is still left. They are working on first taking down buildings since they are unstable and then rebuilding.

There is a small part that is all fixed up with nice cafes and stores. But it was pouring rain remember so what is that guy doing!?

The stores are all made out of containers (the big shipping ones not tupperware!), pretty cool!

Another very scary picture.

And that wraps up my south island trip!!! Thanks for sticking with me through the slow updates but I hope you enjoyed reading a bit about my adventures way down there. Now I have to finish updating you all on the rest of my time in New Zealand because I only have 2 days left here! I'm actually getting pretty sad thinking about all the goodbyes, I'm going to miss all the different families we have created!

Love and miss you tons,

Michele

Rangitata Oct 12-13

Hi everyone! My second to last day on the road with Stay! It came surprisingly fast. 

Our first stop was Lake Tekapo, another very beautiful lake. This area is the best place in the southern hemisphere to star gaze. Sadly, I didn't get to. This is the Church of the Good Shepard, the cutest tiniest church I've ever seen. It was created for the farmers in the town and now it is used for extremely expensive, beautiful weddings. 

This is a giant knit sweater! Yup that's right it's real lol. It's held the world record for quite some time now and just generally seems pretty cool. There are kiwi birds and kiwi fruits and lots of cool squares!

Another stop was to see this giant tree. I think it took about 7 people to wrap their arms around it. 

So we got to the hostel and there was no town or anything and the only activity was the white water rafting so I decided to go on a walk. As I was walking along a cow field some cows started following me, I thought I was making good friends!

But then the entire team of cows were following me and making sorta mad noises...I don't think we were friends.

Then back to the hostel where there was the largest bunk beds I've ever seen, three high! Of course I slept on the top, I have to see what it was like!

I'M SO EXCITED OBAMA WON!!! Haha I just found out and figured I would let you all know lol

Alright with just a couple days left I'm hoping I'll finish everything, wish me luck!

Love,

Michele

Mt Cook Oct 11-12

Hello! After Queenstown the family had a bit of a problem. Lucy was staying behind and then there was no room on the bus for Marissa or Princess. Apparently they hadn't booked onto the bus so they couldn't go with us, it was so so sad our family was dispersing!

With our new bus driver and new group there were some new places to see! To be honest, I can't quite remember the name of this lake. It was so incredibly blue with rolling mountains. The picture doesn't do it justice, it was really amazing.

Here is one of our first looks at Mt Cook, the highest mountain in New Zealand. 

When we got to our hostel James and Hannah were really tired from not getting sleep in Queenstown so they needed a nap and a good bath (there was a real bath tub in out room it was so exciting!). Queenie and I decided to do the hike to the base of Mt Cook. There were some foot bridges on the walk, Mom I thought you would love them especially when they swang with the wind.

There were a few other obstacles on the way. Queenie had to shuffle on the railing of this cliff because of the big puddle, it was really funny to watch. Then I just walked right through the puddle with my hiking boots.

Postcard perfect much?

And we made it! When you're there it just looks like the scariest, craziest mountain ever. I could never imagine hiking it. It was extremely windy and cold at this point so we didn't stay too long.

But we stayed long enough to take a few pictures! Queenie tried about a hundred times to get us and the mountain in the picture but it was pretty hard haha.

That night I learned how to cook fried rice. Hannah is a chef so she taught me a lot throughout the trip, I can cut a pepper and avocado perfectly (I'll cut them up for that dinner you all are inviting me too! hahaha).

Love and miss you all,

Michele

Queenstown Oct 9-11

Hey everyone! So now that my computer is fixed (yup, it sadly broke this weekend but luckily I made friends with the right people!) I can finish updating you on my south island trip!

To begin, I thought for a second I was in the book George and the Giant Peach I mean look at these fruits! Our stop was in Cromwell, where we had a nice photo shoot with 4 huge fruits. We also went to a delicious fruit stand. I found a 5 kg (a bit more than 10 lbs) bag of apples for $3. I was kicking myself that I couldn't just bring them back home for the horses! Man, if I had that kind of cheap fruit stand near me my horses would never buck me off!

So there is a small problem...all these pictures are out of order and I can't figure out how to fix it, just bare with me. The second day in Queenstown I took a bus to Milford Sound. I woke up super early and didn't get back till super late but it was worth it. The weather was pretty crummy, lots of rain and high winds- you would think this made the sights awful but in fact it made it even better. Because of all the rain there were probably over 300 waterfalls. You can see a few next to me, and it was just like that the entire boat ride, pretty crazy.

Here is the typical view on the post cards of Milford Sound but for me it wasn't so picture perfect!

There are two year round waterfalls in the sound, this is one of them. As you can tell they are so huge. I tried going out onto the front of the boat to see this one and came back looking like I had just taken a shower with my clothes on.

Then driving home the weather was great, of course! This is what some of the three hour drive there looks like. Seems like the perfect place to be with just fields and mountains around you.

Now backing up. This is a glimpse of the amazing Queenstown. I suggest it to everyone ahhh it's such a cool town! As you can somewhat see it's a big ski town with the mountains right there. There are lots of shops, cafes, and bars- really a great place to go!

This is the peaceful view that most of Queenstown sees.

Alrighty here we are! This is James and me off to our big exciting.....bungee jump!! Just before Queenstown we made a stop to sign up for any bungee activities people wanted to do. Since I had the Milford Sound tour the next day the only time I could do a bungee was at that exact time. So James and I just went for it!

And by went for it I mean we went for the highest bungee in Australasia (basically the highest in the world other than one in Japan I think). It's a small 134 meters and a 9 second free fall (the time you're just falling and can't feel the bungee pulling you back).

The Nevis is in the middle of a canyon. You do the jump from that small white thing hanging in the middle of the canyon.

Here I am, absolutely terrified, getting the bungee put on and everything else. 

And here I am wiggling out to the ledge. I was laughing and freaking out of course. 

You'll have to have me over for dinner to find out if I actually ended up jumping!

This is what I expect for dinner.... 

This is the famous Ferg Burger, the most massive burger I've eaten and so delicious. We went there for dinner and pretty much had to just sit for a while after since everyone in our family was too full to do anything more. 

Hope you're figuring out how to make this massive burger for my dinner! 

Love and miss you all,

Michele

Wanaka Oct 8-9

Hello all! I realized I start all the blogs the same, I'll have to change it up. 

Howdy y'all! On a nice, rainy Monday we made our way to Wanaka. It is a town just outside of Queenstown, I would say it's almost a mini Queenstown. 

Our first stop was not suppose to be a stop but the cows had to go home! Sort of reminds me of Switzerland. Typically in New Zealand you see sheep everywhere. And when I say everywhere I mean there are 4 million people here and 40 million sheep!

We then stopped at a hike around a supposed really nice lake. It was pouring rain and I really wanted to stretch my legs so I was the only one who went on this 40 minute walk haha. I got quite wet then when I was just about back Hannah and James stole me to do it all again! Needless to say I got an extra unwanted shower that day.

This is a fantastic waterfall. When we looked at it for about a minute then looked at the trees they looked like they were moving, it was pretty crazy!

When we got to Wanaka Marissa and I went for a walk around the town and lake. Even on a rainy day it was really good to see. The town is pretty upscale with stone restaurants and expensive shops.

The next morning a few of us got to go to Puzzle Word. Where we got our minds blown by all this intense mind blowing stuff. But here are a couple pictures of the fun outside! You'll have to see me to understand the real craziness of Puzzle World.

Get ready to jump into another story tomorrow! Hehe a bit of a pun there if you know what I mean!

Love and miss you all,

Michele