Summer 2010

Here is my second blog! SUMMER 2010! This summer is just as awesome as last summer so i will try to write about some of the things i have been doing just to keep everyone updated. i didn't take pictures of everything, and pictures never capture just what it was like to be in a place but i am including all my best pictures!
The first picture is of a fountain in Albert Park, Auckland, New Zealand. but first: how did i get to New Zealand?
This summer i wanted to travel (of course) so i signed up for and International Student Volunteers project in NZ. i didn't know what to expect...
I flew out of Edmonton, over the beautiful Rocky Mountains, stopped in Vancouver, then straight to Auckland on May 13/14th. i had a free day before meeting my volunteer group so I took the city bus in to Auckland city early in the morning, and chatted with the bus driver while the sun rose and we drove on the left side of the rode past beautiful and unfamiliar plants and trees. then i took a train to get to the centre of the city

I walked out of the train station, found an information centre, walked around. the picture above is of the sky tower, it is a great ladmark that saved me from getting lost a few times.

me with my backpack in Albert Park

i walked around the harbour, sky tower at night. I spent my first night in New Zealand at a friends place. the first thing i ate when i got there was a golden kiwi :) we had supper of chineese vegan dumplings at a cute restraunt on Dominion Road called New Flavour!

early in the morning on the 15th i took a bus back to the airport to meet my International Student Volunteers group! we got on a bus right away and went to our camp close to Waihi in the Bay of Plenty region. there were 27 of us, and we got along very well!

at a viewpoint. our volunteer leader Daryl had great stories about Maori culture, how they take pride in nature, and well kept land increases their Mana (pride, self respect) how they believe they dont own the earth, they come from the land, go back to the land. They have really great ledgends...

we picked kiwifruit! they grow on huge vines

a part of Maori culture is a pride in their ancestors. they can trace their family trees back to when they came to New Zealand in huge canoes. this is a replica.

we went on hikes, saw a "small" kaori tree that had a trunk that a car could fit inside, guides talked at us about conservation... fantail birds, volcanoes, medicinal plants. We were traditionally welcomed by the a Maori group with much ceremony and singing which was very fun. they were converted to Chritianity but maintain their old beliefs too, and they have church/community centre buildings called Marae in many towns with wonderful carvings and woven panels and painted paterns all depicting legends. This is a hill we climbed where a Maori settlement used to be, there are stories about all teh islands and caves:

these pictures are from Cathedral Cove where we went one weekend. we stayed in Coromanel for one night in a hostel on the beach. 3 of us went swimming in the freezing Pacific Ocean water in the middle of the night in the waves, and stayed in for a long time because the waves were so fun! the mexy day 4 of us went kayaking in the waves! i flipped twice and it was great!

here are some pictures of where i slept for the 2 weeks at camp, quite comfortable bunk beds in a big room. the camp had a dining room in a different building, where we played a lot of card when it was raining. we only planted trees for 3 days, about 2500 trees on a very steep valley above a small river. the trees were about 50 cm tall, 4 different native species. we formed chains to pass them down teh hill, and paired up so one personn dug holes and one took the plastic bag off the roots and planted the tree.

we also visited an elementary school for a day and taught them about our home countries. we made posters and everything!

another day we visited a training centre for disabled people, which was very cool, mentally disabled people were supported so they could work and make money. they had a great facility where at least 100 people were sewing, doing carpentry, growing trees for volunteers like us to plant, making dartboards, art, cooking, maintaining a park, it was a really happy place.

another day we worked on a hiking trail in a park, we walked for an hour to get to a river where we built up the trail with wheelbarrowfuls of clay and spread a huge bag of gravel that a helicopter dropped off, and pulled weeds growing over the trail. it was really fun, we worked as a team very well.

I had my birthday at camp on a tree planting day, and in the evening we had a cake and everyone signed a card :)

the food was pretty basic, i had vegetarian meals which was very nice because i got better quality groceries especially for me! lots of penut butter and honey sandwiches, muesli every day for breakfast :) noodles, rice, soup, lasagna... the fruit was Very good, we had mandarins, persimmons, fejoas.

this is a zip line at camp, it started at the top of the structure, about 3 storeys high, and went about the length of a hockey rink. we tried it in the dark!

this is in the Auckland airport at the end of my 2 weeks of volunteering about to fly to Queenstown for 2 weeks of adventure tour! in the middle is Kristina and on the right is Tristan, they were our volunteer project leaders that organised day to day things and ran meetings. they were a lot of fun. Kristina was studying kakapo parrots at Otago university and spent months on a remote island recording their mating calls. Tristan explained rugby and cricket to me.

the last night before flying to the South island the 27 of us stayed with a big Maori extended family in a Marae- their kind of church building. they cooked a huge meal, we sang and Tommy Kapai, a sucessful children's book author, told legends.

Queenstown!

I rode the Shotover Jet, a jet boat that goes on the shotover river, doing 360 turns and speeding very close to the cliffs! all in the rain, so it felt like little rocks were hitting my face.

we had supper in an Indian restauraunt, and browsed in some stores.

these pictures are from when i hiked up and down the mountain overlooking Queenstown:

the trees were so thick at the top it was dark

i watched paragliders taking off from the top of the mountain, just running off the edge of a steep hill, and floating off over the city. it looked great!

in the afternoon, a view from a park, where i discovered a lovely rose garden while going for a jog.

the scenery from the bus was beautiful. vineyards, kiwifruit orchards, sheep, dairy farms, hills, thick forests, lakes, rivers!

in one town we stopped at i found a beach and watched some surfers while i ate my lunch.

I hiked up the Franz Josef glacier! largest in teh southern hemisphere. we squeezed through small crevasses, climbed steep parts using ropes.

we walked through a lush forest to get to the glacier! there was a thundering waterfall beside it.

this was my group's guide, Simon.

All the hostels we stayed in were really fantastic. one had a hot pool, which we spent hours and hours in. another had a sauna! we were in dorm rooms with bunkbeds usually. different combinations of people in each because we were all good friends. i was surprised how well i got to know most of the 27 people in my group in only a month. we had some good conversations.

we cooked our own meals in some hostels, one night i microwaved rice, very unappetizing, but another day i cooked angel hair spaghetti with a friend and we put fresh absil, cherry tomatoes, garlic and mozarella cheese on it. another day i made a big quinoa salad with dried fruit, nuts, and vegetables in it, the perfect food to have as leftovers while travelling!

we went dancing a few nights when we were in different towns, we didnt just play cards!

the whole time the weather was quite chilly, getting close to freezing in the night, but i stayed warm enough using my sleeping bag and blankets.

we did a walk around the "pancake rocks" strange formations. scary surge pool:

a fur seal colony. they smelled horrible and i was quite a distance away:

these pictures are from 2 different walks, the plants are so interesting!

we rode a ferry from Nelson to Picton on the North Island

in Wellington we went to the Te Paupa museum, which was very good. i also saw the art gallery and botanical gardens, and the "beehive" and parliament buildings from outside. it was a cold day! i drank a lot of tea every day.

we went whitewater rafting at Rotorua, which was an experience. we were given wetsuits, booties, sweaters, lifejackets, helmets and paddles and were stuck in an 8 person raft with a guide who shouted instructions and we went over the biggest drops right at the first part of the run before we knew what we were doing! so we quickly became confident and were splashing other rafts, and standing up to touch bridges we were going under with our paddles. the scenery was amazing. the guy in front of me got hit by a branch and fell out near the end, so i lost my paddle pulling him back in and could just sit and enjoy the ride. we sang songs on the bus home that day.

the next picture is at the natural hot pools called Hell's Gate at Rotorua, they were bizare, some pools were grey, some black, some of the ground was orange and yellow, there was steam coming from everywhere, mud bubbling up, one pool actually boiling, a steaming waterfall, it was an amazing little area.

Close to our hostel was a park full of little steaming ponds, but not so extreme as the place we walked through earlier in the day, because there were plants growing around them. I went for a walk there alone at dusk, exactly what i was told not to do. our tour leader told a story of a tourist that got serious burns when walking home drunk through that park and going off the path. all the pools were fenced off really well, so i was not worried. i could hear bubling mud and the whole forest was full of steam. as darkness fell, i found a platform over a volleyball court sized natural hot pool surrounded by trees with thick steam rising up from it like smoke from a fire. the steam warmed my fingers and face from the chilly breeze that was wafting it around. sometimes the steam was swirling away from me, sometimes it was billowing towards me. sometimes there was a dome of fog over my head almost blocking out the streetlights that i could see on two sides. the trees cast spidery shaddows. i watched the light from the stars appear through the gaps in the steam and tried to see the southern cross in their unfamiliar formations. i tried but could not think of anything to wish on the first star i saw that night.

ths steam only had a faint sulfur smell, and the warm waves felt so pleasant. i could hear unfamiliar insects chirping and clicking to eachother in the trees behind me. i could see dead branches in the hot pool. i stood for about half an hour watching the rising, dancing steam flow up to the sky around me. then i found my way back to the hostel, and wrote that description in my journal!

we went to rainbow springs, a wildlife park where they have a buch of native animals, but mostly raise kiwi birds. they collect the eggs from the wild where they have almost no chance of surviving and raise them until they can release them back. there were 3 kiwi birds in an enclosure which got to see! they are the strangest uncoordinated looking things with huge feet and no wings that are visible, and tiny heads. their bodies were large and they rushed back and forth and stopped to thrust their beaks in the ground and make sniffing noises. they are not at all like the cute stuffed animals.

and then we went zorbing:

this is after we survived the ride, i am putting on a brave face but i was in a bit of pain! the zorb that my friend and i were in got caught by a gust of wind and got going so unusually fast it went OVER the fence at the end of the hill! the landing was quite hard and i bit my tounge badly!

you can see the fence we went over, and the place the zorbs are supposed to stop!

aparently it was the first time in 14 years that zorbing has been going on on that hill that a zorb has gone over the fence. the staff were quite surprised! when we were in the zorbs we did not know what was going on. the zorbs are balls of transluscent plastic, and you dive through this small hole into the smaller inner ball that has a bit of water in it and is held off the ground by elastics, and it gets zipped closed and rolls down the hill, while you are spinning and sliding and screaming inside.

in the evening we went on a walk through a forest with cliffs covered in glowworms! we carried flashlights, and walked through a tunnel, around a gorge on a wooden walkway, into a cavern with stalagmites and stalactites, and over a bridge. a really cool walk in the dark! the stars were so bright!

in Waitomo we went blackwater rafting in a huge cave. we had two guides who taught us how to absail down a rope 11 storeys, then we rode a zip line, i screamed on the zip line, flying into the darkness! then we ate oatmeal squares and drank hot tea and jumped, each with an inner tube off a cliff into a river, getting soaked through, and paddled with our hands in the freezing water upstream to look at glowworms, which were spectacular. then floated downstream a bit, left our inner tubes behind, and walked/floated/swam down this little river and over uneven rocks through cracks, under ledges, around a waterfall, stopped to warm up with tea and chocolate, then climbed out though some tunnels. that was 4 hours in a cave! it was my favorite activity that i have done in New Zealand!

june 9th we arrived in Auckland again, i had lunch in a park, climbed a tree, talked with friends all day. we all had supper together and went out. then on june 10th most of the group left in the morning, and i went to Kelly Tarlton's aquarium with two friends who had an evening flight. we thouroughly enjoyed the stingray feeding demonstration, the monorail around the penguin enclosure, and the moving walkway under the shark tank! it was all aimed at young kids but was really facinating for us too! we had lunch in a fancy but inexpensive restauraunt overlooking the harbour, played some pool, then they left to Canada and Holland and i was alone in Auckland!

i spent that night at a hostel, then went couchsurfing! http://www.couchsurfing.org/

its a fantastic website, it is a network for travellers to meet locals. how it works is everyone writes a page with a bit about themselves, and other couchsurfers you meet leave references on your page, so when i am travelling i read peoples pages and their references, and if they seem interesting i send them a message asking if i can stay at their house for a few nights. I used the website in Edmonton because the couchsurfing community also is used to organize meetings in cafes, and potlucks, and i met a bunch of friends and travellers in Edmonton.

Here is a blurb from the website explaining it:

"What is CouchSurfing?
CouchSurfing is an international non-profit network that connects travelers with locals in over 230 countries and territories around the world. Since 2004, members have been using our system to come together for cultural exchange, friendship, and learning experiences. Today, over a million people who might otherwise never meet are able to share hospitality and cultural understanding.
Our mission as an organization is to create inspiring experiences: cross-cultural encounters that are fun, engaging, and illuminating. These experiences take many forms. CouchSurfing's initial focus was on hosting and "surfing" (staying with a local as a guest in their home). Alongside these core experiences, we now also facilitate a growing array of activities and events.
We have a vision of a world where everyone can explore and create meaningful connections with the people and places they encounter. Each CouchSurfing experience shared by our members brings us closer to that vision.
How does CouchSurfing work?
CouchSurfing members share hospitality with one another. These exchanges are a uniquely rich form of cultural interaction. Hosts have the opportunity to meet people from all over the world without leaving home. "Surfers," or travelers, are able to participate in the local life of the places they visit. We also give more people the chance to become travelers, because "surfing" lowers the financial cost of exploration.

Is CouchSurfing safe?
When a lot of people hear about CouchSurfing, they wonder if it's OK to invite someone new into their home, or stay with someone they've never met. Our members think about safety, too -- and that's exactly why CouchSurfing is a safer way to meet people than you might think. As a tight knit community, CouchSurfers help protect themselves and each other by educating themselves and sharing information.
With CouchSurfing, you have a lot more information about new people than you do in most circumstances. Think about when you meet someone at a hostel or on a train. What information do you have? Just your own first impressions. Through CouchSurfing, it's more like meeting a friend of a friend. You have the chance to read all about other members' experiences with that person, whether positive or negative. You have a full profile's worth of information about their interests and perspectives. You can see who their friends are and how they know them. And you have the ability to correspond with them as much as you want before you meet them.
Go to our safety page for more information about the different types of information systems that help you make educated decisions while using CouchSurfing. "

so i stayed for 8 nights in 3 different houses, and made some great friends in Auckland! much better than staying in hostels, because i got great advice on what to see in the city.

on the 12th i stayed with Craig and his roommates. he is a student and DJ, artsy type. his flat was a lot of fun, i made myself at home and slept in a very comfortable hammock in the attic for 13 hours straight. we discussed the oil spill in the gulf of Mexico. we ate at Burgerfuel, a gormet burger chain in New Zealand. then we went to a vegan potluck at his enironmental activist type friend's place. the next night i went to a Hare Krishna supper in a yoga loft that he recomended. it was the best food i had had in a long time! there were some monks, and everyone was chanting a mantra in unison and playing insturments and talking about oneness and the connection to nature, and non-material happiness and consciousness, and balance and living simply and i joined in and it was altogether an interesting night. i enjoyed the discussion.

June 14th i spent the day in the city library using the free internet, then moved my backpack to stay with Tom (a musician- a bassist) and his roommates Amy, Evan, Ben-o... in another cool flat. i carried my backpack quite a bit, and it worked very well! Amy, Tom, and i went to a impromptu jazz concert at the wine cellar that night, which was very awesome. the next day i spent going to a second hand bookstore and vegetarian restraunt, then went to the play Sweeny Todd, whith Tom, who was part of the orchestra. it was a great production! at the theatre at the university.

June 16th i walked to the Auckland Museum, in a huge park with gardens! really good museum, with an interesting exhibit about food that i liked a lot, and lots about Maori culture, history of NZ, wars, plants and animals. then spent time with Amy- a painter- we got groceries, went to an art talk with 20 photographers giving presentations about their work, which was very interesting to see.

June 17th i had a delicious lunch served by Hare Krishna monks in a park, then moved to Chris' house, he is a computer programmer. there are 2 other couchsurfers staying here who are from Melbourne, so i am getting a lot of advice about moving there! we walked to the Auckland botanic gardens, which cover a huge area, and i thouroughly enjoyed walking around them, and eating a few mandarins off a tree. then getting lost on my way back and asking a few very friendly people for directions. then we watched a New Zealand made movie called scarfies, which was a very well made comedy then thriller about university students in Dunedin. we have been cooking great meals at Chris' place: pavlova, key lime pie, dhal, roasted vegetables, fritatta, sweet potato soup, and today we ate lunch at a cafe in a buddhist temple after visiting mount Wellington and One Tree Hill. So i am having a great time! the weather has been good, it hasn't rained lately, and it is not too cold.

So i am flying to Melbourne on Monday the 21st, and will try to keep everyone updated more often on how things are going!