New Zealand

The Final Post!

2009-08-02T13:45:00.000-07:00

Rachel and I in Seattle.

It's been almost two weeks now since Rachel and I returned to the USA, and I think I speak for both of us when I say that we are happy to be home! We spent a great week in LA and Seattle where we saw many of our friends again (special thanks to Katie and Jess for accomodating us!), and then made our returns to Ephrata, WA and Hamilton, MT. It's wonderful to see family again, but sad to say goodbye to each other. The last year in New Zealand was an amazing experience and we both learned a lot and met so many great people from all over the world. It is hard to put those experiences behind us now, but it's time for the next phase in our lives to begin!

Wish us luck, and if you ever get the chance, I highly recommend
a visit to New Zealand (click here).

Chch-Chch-Chch

2009-07-20T12:46:00.000-07:00

Rachel, Heike and I at our first rugby game in Christchurch.

Hi everyone! This is just a picture post to wrap-up our last few months in New Zealand! As most of you probably know, Rachel and I are now back in the United States of America (as of yesterday) and still recovering from the jet-lag! It's been truly great to be back home (although we are still in LA so not our actual homes yet), but our time in New Zealand was a wonderful, one-of-a-kind experience that neither of us will ever forget. We still plan to post a few more things this week so the blog isn't over quite yet- check back soon and, as always, thank you for reading!

Heike, Jenn, Rachel and I at the game.

I believe they call this a "scrum."
Rugby is a confusing sport for me, so don't take
anything I say on the topic too seriously.

Half-time consisted of police dogs running down people
dressed as criminals (or real criminals???) and dragging them off the field.
It was awesome, and served as a warning to all those kids out there who
might be considering criminalism.

In the Tepuna o Waiwhetu (Christchurch Art Gallery).

A casual moment for Rachel and Daryl in between gallery viewings.

Not typically a utilizer of the thumbs-up pose, so this must have
been a really special moment for me?

At a coffee shop in Christchurch a few days before Daryl left New Zealand...

... and at dinner the next night.

Port Hills lookout over Christchurch City.
If you squint you can see the Southern Alps in the distance.

American flatmates at the lookout.

One of Christchurch's less abstract statues,
a bundle of wheat that lights up at night.
If that's not cool, I don't know what is.

Some of my friends from when I was working in Wellington
visited the South Island and stayed for a week in Christchurch!
At the same time our friend Rike visited. They got along cuz they
all had Germany in common.

Christchurch Cathedral in Cathedral Square, Christchurch.

We took the Germans up to the Port Hills lookout, where they
were completely unimpressed by this "castle."
Apparently the New Zealand idea of a castle is a joke
compared to the ones in Germany. Pfft.

Port Hills.

At the lookout.

We took a roadtrip to Hanmer Springs to
hang out in the hotsprings for an afternoon.

Florian.

Rachel, Me, Marco (who was completely unaware
of the game "marco-polo" until I informed him)

Oh New Zealand, how typical.

Rike and Marco made us all a version of Mulled wine which is a really
common/traditional cold weather drink in Germany.

Another cold night spent indoors, leads to a lot of this sort of thing...

Saying goodbye to Flo and Marco :(

At the All Blacks (New Zealands National Rugby Team) vs. Italy

The All Blacks!
They are pretty much like superheroes in NZ, where Rugby is the
national sport and insanely popular.

A great night (although FREEZING). Rike left a few days after
this and it was sad saying goodbye because she was the first
friend we made in NZ. Hopefully we'll see each other again someday!

For the 4th of July, obviously no one else was
celebrating, so we decorated our flat and barbecued to
get into the holiday spirit.

Homemade food is really exciting for poor backpackers.

Then my friend Steve (Irish) visited so I got to see
him one last time before leaving the country!

Our last night out with good friends!

And finally, saying goodbye to Henny (Dutch), the head of reception
at Vagabond Backpackers where we worked for the last few months.

The one where Taylor visits!

2009-06-29T01:19:00.000-07:00

In typical (and awesome) fashion, I waited two months before I got around to posting the blog about my friend Taylor's visit to New Zealand. It is well worth the wait though, I assure you. For those of you who don't know, Taylor is a friend of mine from Whitworth who I traveled around the British Isles with back when I did that school program where I was missing from the USA for three months. We've been friends ever since and both love travelling, so I was obviously excited when she decided to use her vacation time from work to visit New Zealand. She stayed for one week, only had her luggage for about five and 1/2 days of that week (the airlines did the unthinkable and left her bag in SanFran) and saw a lot of the South Island, with yours truly as her tour guide...

Dark outlines of Taylor and I in front of
the Chalice in Christchurch City Center.

Taylor and Rachel walking around the Botanic
Gardens in Christchurch. It was fall at the time so all the leaves were
changing colors, which was a bit weird for Taylor, who came from
spring weather at home.

Hangin' out with a giant marble sun dial, just one of the many ridiculously
exciting things we were able to show Taylor in Christchurch.

We also showed Taylor this great exhibit at the Canterbury Museum.
It's a now-extinct Moa bird that the ancient Kiwi's used to hunt.
Perhaps Moa's are extinct because of their complete inability to feel
threatened by sharp objects being pointed at them?

Taylor and I in Christchurch City Center.

After a couple days in Christchurch, Taylor and I packed our
bags and took Tiny Dancer on a roadtrip around the central
South Island. Our first stop was at Lake Tekapo.

Finely ground rock in the glacial melted waters give
Lake Tekapo a unique turquoise color.

Attempt #1 at a cool jumping shot.
We just look like we're dancing. Which we were not.

There we go. Totally cool.

I finally got around to driving in New Zealand! The left side of the
road looks exactly like the right side, just reversed.

Next stop on the road trip was Aoraki Mount Cook.
At 3754 metres, Mt. Cook is New Zealand's highest mountain and contributes
one of the hundreds of peaks which make up the famous Southern Alps.

Unfortunately for Taylor and I, the clouds decided
to reveal all of the peaks EXCEPT Mt. Cook itself.
We still wanted pictures though, so we did what we could
with the material at hand.

A googled photo of Mount Cook. So Taylor, now we know what it looks like...

Me with Sir Edmund Hillary.
He is probably the most celebrated Kiwi figure in New Zealand.
After achieving the first successful ascent of Mount Everest in 1953, he returned
to his native country and climbed Mt. Cook and many other peaks.

Me with Tiny Dancer and Mount Cook.

In Arrowtown. The Arrow Miners Band.

Arrowtown in the Fall.

We hiked up to a monument that overlooked the town.

There is a time in every photoshoot where I decide to make the picture
more exciting by jumping. This is the time I fell, rolled three times and came back
to the monument with a scraped elbow and a humble expression.

Queenstown! With The Remarkables in the background. Standing on a very shaky
and weak dock. You'd never be able to tell (and we'd never mention it because
we're too proud) but Taylor and I were actually a little afraid of a collapse.

Me and The Remarkables.

Sitting our way across New Zealand.

Besties.

We were excited because we'd just learned about them in the
Canterbury museum.

Botanic Gardens in Queenstown. Ugly, right?

Leaving Queenstown and the central South to head for the East Coast.

The Moeraki Boulders, on a sunnier day than the last time I was there.
Also a time of day where the tide is higher, making it more
difficult to climb on the boulders.

Taylor prepping for a run onto the boulders while the tide is out.

Run, jump and...

Victory!

And this is the part where I leave Taylor stranded on boulders in New Zealand.

But only because I got myself stranded as well.

After the boulders, we stayed the night in Oamaru, and drove out to the Elephant Rocks the next morning. They are strangely sculptured remnants of limestone that started out as limey sand on the sea floor perhaps 24 million years ago. Within the last million years, the limestone was uplifted and water and wind weathered it into the shapes you see in the pictures.

The Elephant Rocks didn't make it into Lord of the Rings trilogy, but they
were used in the first Chronicles of Narnia movie!

We got back into Christchurch at the end of Taylor's week-long visit and she flew out the next day. Thankfully, her luggage made it all the way home with her. It was really fun but also sad to see her go, since she's the only person from home that I've seen in the last nine months! However, since Rachel and I will be coming home in just under three weeks now, we have the reunion with all our family and friends to look forward to! Thanks for visiting Taylor, and I hope everyone else enjoyed the pictures as well :)

Christchurch and Beyond

2009-06-07T16:52:00.000-07:00

Kara and I arrived safely in Christchurch, where we have been settled for the past 2 months-ish. We both found cleaning jobs at a hostel where we cleaned in exchange for free accommodation. We then got promoted to working reception and now get to live there in our own apartment for free. It's a nice set up and Christchurch has been a great place to live and to enjoy the rest of our holiday. Before I dive into our first few days here, I thought I would flashback to the Nelson Lakes. Our friend Daryl had a couple of pictures of us at the lakes that we recently got from her, so here they are. Thanks Daryl!

Kara and I with our friends at the Nelson Lakes
From left: Daryl, Me, Paul, Kara, Dave

Very vibrant mushrooms we came across on our hike around the lakes.
Hopefully you can see it.

Apparently we missed the memo on bringing our funny hats.
Good thing Dave remembered.

Dave modeling his chicken hat.
He's so cocky.

After arriving in Christchurch, we took a day trip to Banks Peninsula and stopped at Akaroa. About 75K from Christchurch. Akaroa is a nice, exotic little town with harbor and dolphin cruises, cafes, and other touristy shops. It was a beautiful place to wonder around and relax for the day.

You could literally step out of your car and into the water.

Many boats in the harbor.

The weather was great!

Kara and the bay being all pretty.

Just another photo op.

A view of Akaroa.

Walking around town.

Tree hugger, literally.
I love palm trees.

Akaroa at sunset.

Christchurch is known for being the most English of New Zealand's major cities and is also the gateway to the south island. It has many free activities including the Canterbury museums and art galleries. It also has weekly markets, held in Cathedral Square where you can purchase many authentic New Zealand items. It resides in the Canterbury district and is close to ski resorts, whale watching, hot springs and many other beautiful outdoor attractions.

The historic Christchurch tram runs right through the middle of town.

Enjoying a leisure day with friends and a cup of Jo.
Kara with Wanda, another co-worker from Wellington.
We've been fortunate to see many friends who have passed through, or who have flown out of Christchurch, as it is the central hub for international flights on the south island.

One activity you can do in Christchurch is punting on the Avon River.

We enjoyed the last few hot days of summer at the beach in Sumner.

On our way home one evening, we saw this little hedgehog by the front door.
Here he is trying to hide. He was a very cute little shy guy.

Christchurch Cathedral.

Kara and I eating the best chocolate cake! It came with a side of ice cream and hot fudge drizzled all over it. Can life get any better? I submit that it cannot!

So there you have it, an intro to Christchurch and some of the surrounding areas! It has been a really good home for us, with lots of things to keep us entertained in and around the city. We only have about 6 weeks left in New Zealand and we can't believe how fast it's gone! Stay tune for more of our Christchurch activities. Thanks for reading everyone!!!

More fun on the South Isle!

2009-05-24T03:50:00.000-07:00

Once again it's time for......drum roll please....
Kara and Rachel's South Island Journey: Part 4!

After frolicking in Queenstown and Wanaka we made our way down to the very south of the south. We figured since we went to the most northern point of the north island (see post #6 "It's Reinga Time") we should probably see the most southern point of the south island, just to be fair, and to say that we have been there. So we took a day trip down to Invacargil and Bluff to see the southern tip. (warning: lots of pictures!)

We were really REALLY disappointed that this sign did not have an arrow
pointing to Washington or Montana. The nerve.

This picture requires reader participation! Please select the answer
that would best describe what we are doing in this photo:

A. Corinna and I practicing our disco moves as Kara, the maestro directs us.
B. Corinna, Kara and I trying to make a clever picture and point in
some random direction to mimic the arrows.
C. All the above
D. None of the above
E. Other:___________________________

Another view from the southern point.
If you look hard enough, you just might see Antarctica.

After spending a couple of hours in Bluff and Invacargil, we started making our way up the east coast of the south island. Our first stop was in Dunedin. Dunedin was founded by Scottish settlers. It has many Scottish-influenced cathedrals and Victorian architectural buildings. The city is also know for having many steep hills, which is great if you are driving around in a stick shift and happen to get stopped at the top of each hill. Dunedin was a neat city, but 2 days there was plenty for us!

One of the old cathedrals.

The Cadbury Chocolate Factory resides in Dunedin. Yum!

Kara in front of the old and famous Railway Station.

We saw these three cute little Maori skater boys in front of us and

were highly entertained by their interactions and skateboarding techniques.

Kara's artistic photography of a street in Dunedin and
me carrying groceries.

We stayed at a hostel in Dunedin called Hogwartz! For those of you
who are Harry Potter fans, you know that Hogwarts is the name of the
school of witchcraft and wizardry that Harry and his friends attend (duh).
Kara, who is probably the biggest Harry Potter fan I know,was thrilled to stay there,
even though they had to spell Hogwarts ending with a 'z' instead of an 's' because
of copyright laws. We did not study witchcraft or wizardry, nor did we see Harry,
Ron or Hermione, but we did marvel at the nice living space we were fortunate to stay in.

The Otago Peninsula just outside of Dunedin.

At the Peninsula we saw a few albatross flying around the banks. The albatross is the largest of the seabird species and has a wingspan of 3.5 meters! That's about 11.5 feet, making one whopper of a bird that I would not like to be attacked by, ever. The is the best shot I could get of the bird because it moved really fast. Please see photo below for a more visual comparison of the albatross to other birds.

The albatross is in red. Like I said, it's a mammoth...with wings.

Dunedin is also the home of Baldwin Street, The Steepest Street in the World.
Many people are attracted to this famous street,and drive their cars up and
down the street for amusement. Our car is old and would probably
not make it to the top if we tried.

So we walked up instead.

....and crawled. It was quite the workout!

A side view of the street going up. Do you feel the steepness?

We made it successfully (and out of breath). Here we are with our
friends Corinna and Daniel.

Just another view from the top looking down.

Some more fun facts about the Steepest Street in the World
that I was too lazy to type out.
*Click on photo to zoom in*

The street is also handy for creating optical illusions and modeling poses.
Lookin' good Kara!

After Dunedin, Kara and I continued up the east coast on our own
and stopped at Boulder Beach to view the large sphere-shaped boulders
created by years of erosion by waves. We had fun with the boulders.

Yes we pushed them together. We are THAT strong.

Just some more of us being silly with the boulders.

On our way up the east coast we stayed in Oamaru for a couple of days.
Oamaru is an old town famous for the arts and has New Zealand's
best-preserved collection of limestone commercial buildings. It also has access to
colonies of blue penguins and the rare yellow-eyed penguins.

Main street in Oamaru.

I liked this red bridge in the botanic gardens.

One evening in Oamaru, we set out to find some penguins!
We first ventured to find the yellow-eyed penguins.

Some senic views on our way to see the penguins.

Wool-dn't you like to know? We bah, I mean saw, many sheep.

We walked for about a half hour to find only one yellow-eyed penguin.
It was worth it because they hide in the bushes and are hard to spot.

More beautiful scenery in New Zealand.

The blue penguins come out in the evening and people are
cautioned to watch the roads carefully and to check under parked
cars for any penguins that waddle into town.

So instead of going to an expensive night tour of the blue penguins, we decided
to try to and find some on our own and behold, we came across this cute
little guy just outside of the penguin tours.

He was so adorable and not even bothered by our presence.

We were lucky to get some snap shots because pictures are not
allowed on the guided tours.

Here is Kara with our little penguin. If only we could take it home with us!

Oamaru at twilight.

Well that concludes the traveling portion of Kara and Rachel's South Island Journey. We've seen some remarkable places! We traveled for about a month and are now settled in Christchurch for the remainder of our working holiday. We will be sure to post about our exciting time in Christchurch and the surrounding areas soon. We miss our family and friends greatly and we look forward to being reunited in about 2 months! Thanks for reading and cheers to you all!

It's another post about the South Island!

2009-05-05T17:56:00.000-07:00

Introducing... Kara and Rachel's South Island journey- Part 3!

After leaving the rainy and cold west coast, we drove
down into the town of Wanaka on a super sunny and
warm afternoon.

Overjoyed by the change in weather, we spent a lot of
time relaxing by the lake and enjoying the sun.

We also spent some time (approximately 2 minutes)
posing in our aviator sunglasses.

One of the many excellently named hostels you can find in New Zealand.
Other fantastic names include Ewe Dream'Inn, The Missing Leg,
The Lazy Shag, Bay Booziee Backpackers, Just the Ducks Nuts, and
perhaps best of all for Harry Potter fans (whoever they are)... Hogwartz!

One of Wanaka's big attractions is a cinema where all the seats are
couches and comfortable old chairs. It's kind of like watching a
big-screen movie in your living room. Only real difference here is that
you don't know all the people in the room with you, and (hopefully) that
would be different were it actually your own personal living room.

The lake again.
We stayed just a few days in Wanaka and then drove
about an hour down to Queenstown.

Corinna and myself on the boardwalk in Queenstown.

Sometimes, when we're bored, we hunt giant
kiwi's and tame them to do our bidding.

Queenstown being all pretty.

Queenstown is a huge tourist town and very beautiful. We'd heard
from fellow travelers that it was "too perfect" and not the real
New Zealand. There are definitely more tourists there than most
places on the South Island, and it's a bit more expensive as a result.
However, being (experienced) tourists ourselves, and only staying
a few days, we didn't mind the "too perfect" qualities, and had a
great time!

A vast number of people go bungi jumping or
jet-boating in Queenstown.
We chose cheaper entertainment: sweets-shopping.

That Rachel is always outdoing me.

Some chocolate I always want to buy because of the packaging.
$8 for a chocolate bar? I am not a rich woman!

From Queenstown, we took a daytrip to Arrowtown, the only
functioning example of a historic town in New Zealand.
Thousands of miners arrived in Arrowtown in 1862 after
the discovery of Gold in the Arrow River, and it earned
itself a reputation as being a wild and lawless town. Miners
from all over the world were greedy for Gold and constantly
faught over claims and water rights. It took "the strong arm of
the law" (according to the towns brochure) and "the power
of the gun" to settle the miners down.

Rachel in a phone booth.
It really sparks intrigue about who she might be calling?
Answer: highlight below
-->> She's not calling anyone! It's a posed photograph!<<-- Surprise!

Corinna, Rachel and myself enjoying the sunny day in Arrowtown.

Rachel by the Arrow River.

A few of the historic houses that have been preserved in the town.

After a few more days in Queenstown, we took another day trip down to the beautiful Milford Sounds. It's hard to decide on a day to visit the sounds, because the weather is so unpredictable in that area. We wanted to go though, and took our chances booking a cruise in advance. As we drove in, the weather wasn't at all promising, but by the time we were getting ready to board the boat, the clouds had started to clear out and the sun was shining!

During the drive into the Sounds.
It was pouring rain, which resulted in hundreds of
cool waterfalls covering the steep cliffs that surrounded us.

Feeling a bit dissapointed about the rain, but then- what's that? Blue sky!

Getting ready to set out. The sand flies were attacking us from
every angle. (You can't see them in this picture, which is why I look
like an idiot. They are there though, they're EVERYWHERE!)

Cruising around the Sounds.

Blue skies, gorgeous mountains, cool waterfalls, can it get any better?

... it can when a RAINBOW is involved!

Driving back after an aesthetically pleasing day in the Sounds.

True or False?
1. You could purchase this bag.
2. You could fit all of your belongings inside it.
3. You could physically lift the bag and carry
it away with you as you travel around New Zealand.

Answers: 1.) True 2.) True 3.) False, very False

Thanks once again for reading everyone! There's more to come about our South Island Journey, so keep checking back. We also want to do a quick shout out to our Moms (and Grandmas). We know it's not quite mother's day yet but we love you and appreciate all your support. We are both so blessed to have the mothers and grandmothers that we do and you are missed greatly while we travel so far away! LOVE TO YOU!

The West-Side

2009-04-19T01:50:00.000-07:00

After staying in the sunny Nelson/Abel Tasman area for 2 weeks, we said goodbye to our friends and ventured down the west coast to accomplish part 2 of "Kara and Rachel's South Island Journey." The west coast was beautiful, scenic and at times caused a bit of car sickness as there is not one single straight road on the west side. Fortunately, we did not toss our cookies (that means throw-up in case you needed a visual) but instead shouted many ooo's and aah's as we continued down the windy terrain. So here is part 2 as promised...

Kara and Rachel go to the Nelson Lakes and watch the boat races.

The Nelson Lakes

Wait, are we in Great Britain?

Not quite speed boats, but a race is a race right?

Just another scenic picture of the lakes. It makes you want to jump in, only...

...there were huge eels in the water. Very inviting if you ask me.

This is just to show you how big the eels were in comparison to the ducks and to human heads.
This was only moments before the ducks, and the heads, were eaten.

Congratulations John!
Whoever he is, he is one lucky guy.

Scenic driving on the west coast.

The weather on the west coast is quite rainy compared to other parts of the south island.

Finally, after months and months, we saw a sunset in New Zealand.

We randomly met Kara's co-worker/friend, Corinna at one of our hostel stays. Here they are itching sand fly bites. They probably have 20 bites on each foot.
Sand fly bites are worse than mosquito bites.
Once you itch them you can't stop, as seen above.

Just some lost orphans in New Zealand.
Trying to keep warm with the heat of the dryer, which was outside.

Kara loves her (warm) laundry!

Careful...careful...
One of the many ways to keep ourselves entertained at hostels.

Kara and Rachel eat pancakes and visit rocks shaped as pancakes.

What better way to start a day of pancakes than to actually eat them?
Yes, they tasted as good as they look.

After not having pancakes since we left for NZ, Kara was ready!
Knife, fork and all.

$11 breakfast. But so worth it!

Fully satisfied.

YEEHAW!
There was a wild west in New Zealand too. Back when the west was young.

Can you see a theme yet?

Pancake Rocks.

The Pancake Rocks are columns of limestone resembling stacks of pancakes.
At high tide with a heavy swell running, seawater is forced upwards through blowholes.

The Blowhole in 3 phases:

The Grand Finale.

Admiring the blowhole.

"Honey, I Shrunk the Kids IV"?
No, just some very tall grass.

Look hard enough and you might be able to see us.

Punkakaiki: Home of the Pancake Rocks.

Kara and Rachel look at dangerous glaciers from a safe distance.

We were. Are YOU?

Franz Josef Glacier.

It's not everyday you get to have a picture with a glacier.

Descriptive warning signs.

Just a bit closer.

The biggest warning sign in the world could stop the bravery that IS Kara Hyatt.

Crossing a river.
Kara did not fall in. However, I did.

Pictures we found of glacier hikers from the early 1900s.

Glacier #2:

Fox Glacier

A detailed close-up of the receding ice.

A friendly lad took our picture in front of ol' Foxy.

The reason we could not get any closer to the glacier.

This is the only picture we have of this cool pond near Fox Glacier.

That is the real color of the water.

The Fox Glacier mountains from a distance.

So there you have it! Part 2. Coming soon Part 3 of Kara and Rachel's South Island Journey...

Kara and Rachel sing "Hanukkah" at Lake Wanaka.
Kara and Rachel visit Queenstown and Arrowtown with Corinna.
Kara and Rachel see seals and waterfalls at Milford Sounds.

You don't want to miss it!

Down South.

2009-04-07T04:05:00.000-07:00

Since leaving Wellington at the end of February, the two of us have transported ourselves to the South Island, where we have been traveling from town to town ever since. Here is Part ONE of Kara and Rachel’s South Island journey, depicted via photographs …

The Interislander ferry transported us (and our car) from
Wellington to the South Island town of Picton.

Helpfully pointing out the departure and destination points.

Goodbye Wellington!

Entering the Marlborough Sounds of the South Island.
Very sparkly and welcoming.

Our first drive on the South Island! Loads of gorgeous
mountains and vineyards...

We spent our first few nights in Nelson, where we enjoyed the sun and the beach. After successfully burning ourselves with New Zealand’s more-intense-than-anywhere-in-America sun rays, we decided beach lounging should not become routine. We met a few girls at our hostel that were also interested in heading up to the Abel Tasman National Park for a few days, so the four of us split petrol costs and packed ourselves into our little car for the ride.

We stopped at Kaiteriteri en-route to the park…
to lounge on another beach.
This one was the first golden sand one we’d seen, so
we ignored the fact that we were still a little sunburned
from previous beach-ness.

At last! A photo of “Tiny Dancer.” Thus named because
the beloved car likes to shake dramatically and sporadically
for the first two or three minutes after being started.

It’s a love-hate relationship.

Rachel at an overlook in the Abel Tasman region.

We stayed two nights at a very remote hostel, which
strongly advertised going to the nearby Mussel Inn (it was pretty
much the only other building within a 10 km distance) for the
live music. Turns out this is where all the hippies of
New Zealand were hiding…

“The Mud Faery Trio” were our entertainers for the
evening, which of course meant there was a man
dressed as a fairy playing the didgeridoo (which
is an Australian Aborigine creation).
It’s always a good day when something like this happens.

Visiting “Pupu Springs,” which is crystal clear, contrary
to what the name suggests.

It’s Australasia’s largest springs, and the world’s clearest fresh water.

At the start of our six-hour coastal trek in the Abel Tasman.
This was the first of many gorgeous golden beaches that we saw on the trek.

Lunch Break.

Putting the shoes back on after crossing a stream.

What do Rachel and Baywatch have in common?
Everything! Except David Hasselhoff. She doesn’t associate with him anymore.

Hiking the steep slope down to Separation Point.

There was a seal colony lounging by the point.

It was extremely windy on Separation Point.
You’d never believe it, but this is not really how we intended
the photo to turn out. What a happy accident.

On our return from the Abel Tasman to Nelson, I could
have sworn I saw… Montana?

Back in Nelson after our fun road-trip, we were reunited
with our friend Rike, who we hadn’t seen in about five months!

Germany, England, Holland and America unite in New Zealand…
...to watch Mamma Mia.

You might not know from looking at her, but Rachel is super
powerful now. She found the one ring that we all thought Frodo
destroyed. It’s bigger than it looks in the movies, eh?

That’s actually because it’s the prop they used for the close up shots.

Walking around Nelson, we spotted a very hippie-ish van, and who
should it belong to but the Mud Faery Trio?! Our favorite
Faeries might be following us…

Coming soon on Part TWO of “Kara and Rachel’s South Island Journey…”

Kara and Rachel go to the Nelson Lakes and watch boat races.
Kara and Rachel eat pancakes and visit rocks shaped as pancakes.
Kara and Rachel look at dangerous glaciers from a safe distance.
Kara and Rachel don’t see the Faeries again, but there’s still time.

Sound exciting? Stay tuned for that, and much more…

The (par)Rents visit!

2009-03-02T17:55:00.000-08:00

As Kara mentioned in her previous post, I get the privilege of posting a blog about my Mom and Dad's trip to New Zealand! Much to my pleasant surprise they decided to come visit me. They thought they would probably never come otherwise, so why not come when the apple of their eye is here! It makes sense, really. Plus, who wouldn't want to leave the snowy, freezing terrain of Ephrata, WA to the sunny summer of New Zealand?? The answer is in the question.

They arrived Feb. 2nd in Wellington and stayed for 10 days traveling around the north and south island. I had to work for part of their visit so they saw the south island in just 5 days (phew!) and then the three of us took off for a few days up the north island. We stopped at the Waitomo Caves and saw the glow worms. Sadly, we weren't allowed to take pictures of the worms, because it scares them and their "light" goes off. We drove down the west coast through New Plymouth, Wanganui and the other coastal towns along the way. We had a great time, and dad became a wiz at driving on the left side of the road. (He only turned onto oncoming traffic once). It was really good to see them after a 4 month absence. We picked up right where we left off. They also got to see where I worked and lived for the summer, and they were very impressed with Kara and I and how independent we are making a living in New Zealand!

My days as a barista at Gloria Jeans ended on the 20th of February, same day as Kara ended at Wagamama. I made some great friends there and will miss them dearly! It was a fun place to work and I enjoyed it...even when I got called in on my days off :0)

Mom and I at Oriental Parade in Wellington

Waiting to cross the street in downtown Wellington on our way to dinner.
We look really calm here because my parents didn't cross the street early
almost getting hit by a bus, with me hiding my face in my hands.
Little did we know at this moment, what would happen later.

In the parking lot at Helen Lowry Hall-our accommodation in Wellington.

Kara and I outside our dorm building at Helen Lowry Hall- our home for 3 months.

We went to Kara's work, Wagamana, for dinner the next day. They both loved the food!
My dad being the typical American complained (jokingly) about
not having enough ice in his drink.

Kara used her 10 minute break to join us at dinner.
She was our waitress and did a fine job!

Mt. Taranaki
One of the scenic wonders of New Zealand's north island

The Waitomo Glow Worm Caves

A picture of the glow worms courteous of Google Image.
We couldn't take pictures inside the cave, as previously noteed.

Did you know that...

The New Zealand glowworm is one of many creatures that naturally produce light (bioluminescence). The light is the result of a chemical reaction that involves several components: LUCIFERIN, a waste product; LUCIFERASE, the enzyme that acts upon luciferin; ATP, adenosine triphosphate, the energy molecule; and oxygen. These combined form an electronically excited product capable of emitting a blue-green light.

The light is used to attract insects, brought into the cave in the rivers, which the glowworm catches and eats. If a glowworm is hungry its light will shine a little brighter and is even more effective. When the female glowworm reaches the adult stage the light is used to attract males for mating.

...now you know.

A picture was taken of our tour group at the end of the Waitomo Caves tour.
No one got seasick, thank goodness!

Dad and I at Paekakariki Beach on the west coast.

Mom and Dad at Otaki Beach.
Their faces say it all, they loved New Zealand!

Me and my fellow Baristas on my last day of work at Gloria Jeans.

Working intensly on my latte foam art.

Me with my co-workers.
They took me out for my going away party.

Me with Karena from Ireland (and some random guy).
She was the only other 23-year-old barista who I worked with..the rest were teens.

Behind the scenes at Gloria Jeans.
I'm steaming milk.

Kara and I are having a great time in Nelson and exploring the south island! We miss all of our friends and family and love you very much! Stay tuned for new posts!

The Wellington Wrap-up

2009-02-25T01:25:00.000-08:00

Elisabeth and I on Cuba Street in Wellington.
Something in this picture is abnormal, but can you tell what it is?
Answer: highlight here -->Umbrella= abnormally large<--

Well! It's been a long time (again) but I finally got around to updating this thing. As some of you probably know, Rachel's parents visited her from the 2nd of Feb to the 12th, so naturally she was busy spending time with them. As a result, this entry will be a little more about what I've been up to, while Rachel herself plans to update the blog soon on all of her own adventures, so check back for that. In the mean time, here are some pictures from our last month and a half in Wellington...

Elisabeth of Austria visited us once again, and we
were able to hang out one last time and say
goodbye- she will be leaving for home in a few weeks time :(
Hard to believe we've been friends and fellow travelers for
five months already.

This is just a photo of our faces- we've been told
people like these (moms, dads, etc.)

Rachel's mom and dad went with us when we test drove and
purchased our CAR a few weeks ago.
That white thing in the foreground is part of it
(the rest of it definitely exists, we just don't have it photographed yet).

"Just $1,600 NZ dollars and the roads of New Zealand are yours!"
Rachel shows concern while Kara dares to dream.

Test Drive.
Um... it definitely drives when we tell it to...
We'll take it!

Thanks to Rachel and her mom, we have
these lovely action shots of me working at Wagamama.

That's some neat palm pilot action right there.
Definitely worthy of the blog.
Interesting fact: that pen was later stolen by a customer.
Yeah. Annoying right?

The Black Seeds are a really popular reggae band here
in New Zealand. We went to their performance at the One Love Fest
in Wellington on Waitangi Day (Feb 6th). That day is a public holiday
that celebrates the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, New
Zealand's founding document, which occurred on Feb. 6th in 1840.

One of those great "accidental zoom" shots that we seem
to be really good at.

Better.
This is us at the festival, enjoying The Black Seeds.

With it being Wellington and all, it was very windy out.
That umbrella caught the wind and flew hundreds of feet in the air!
This photo is taken after it landed (thankfully without impaling anyone)
and the police had nothing better to do than run over and make sure the
umbrella made it safely back to its owner (who I'm sure got a sharp
reprimand for allowing their property to fly away on its own like that).

Just another classy Kiwi bloke enjoying the festival.

I like to feel safe, true, but when they all stand around
together like that it's just intimidating...

The Black Seeds.

My last day of work was last Friday, and I went out with some
of my friends to celebrate and say goodbye, as I was leaving Wellington
soon. I met a lot of really cool people. A lot of them are traveling as well,
so hopefully I'll see them again on the South Island...

I was happy to be done working, but Steve was
heartbroken to see me go.
Sorry Steve.

Yes, I know these people.
The Cuba Street Carnival was last Saturday (the 21st of Feb) and it
was a great, sunny day. People (some of them) dress up and spend the
day roaming the streets, eating, watching live music and doing other
activities of a carnival nature.

Obviously the giant red monster thing was distracting for people...

The Wellington International Ukulele Orchestra.
So cool.

There weren't a lot of rides, but there was this sketchy old ferris
wheel that went backwards, and a little faster than we preferred...

After just about five months on the North Island, Rachel and I left Wellington (a little sad--but exciting too!) and took the ferry all the way to the South Island on Monday. We have spent the last few days in Nelson (the technical "center" of NZ), and are currently planning a road trip down the west coast. It's great to be free from working and feel like we're on vacation again. Thanks for checking in on us and check back soon for Rachel's update on her awesome visit from the rents! Love and miss you all.

Wellington and beyond (briefly).

2009-01-03T04:40:00.000-08:00

Journey to Weta workshop- where they worked
on the special effects for Lord of the Rings.
Worth it? Only for this picture.

Yes it's true, another blog has finally arrived. Apologies for the wait. You'll be glad to know that the snide remarks on facebook and strong hints from various family members were duly noted, and I have once again taken on the task of relaying our New Zealand adventures to you- the avid readers (and especially the accidental internet surfers who I'm sure don't care but read anyway).

Rachel and myself have both been working about 43-47 hour weeks over the holidays, so we have been busy, but the weather has slowly been getting warmer and we have tried to take advantage of any coordinated days off by seeing as much of Wellington as we can. We went to WETA Workshop, which is a special effects department that Peter Jackson started up to handle all the effects for those little movies called Lord of the Rings.

The people over at the New Zealand Tourism Headquarters must LOVE Lord of the Rings and all it did to put New Zealand on the map. You can go just about anywhere and find some sort of cheap souvenier about Lord of the Rings and how New Zealand is the real-life version of Middle Earth. Since the movies were filmed here, I guess that claim is basically true- although it's still kind of a nerdy claim to make. That being said- we totally went to WETA, because, yes, we totally like Lord of the Rings and all that hobbit stuff. Call us nerds if you like, but it's our blog so we'll just delete it ;)

Unfortunately, after we got out to the "Workshop", we were dissapointed to see that it was really more of a souvenier shop with a few of the life-size models from the films and a few of the other props on display. We didn't actually get to see how they do the special effects or anything like that. Although we DID get to take our picture with Gollum, and an Orc donning festive attire, so that kind of made up for it. Kind of. Not really.

Fortunately our other excursions in Wellington haven't been as disappointing, and we have spent a lot of time hanging out on the Oriental Parade, where there is a great sandy beach for us to relax in the sun.

Oriental Bay, a nice beach... but a fake beach.
The city council decided to revamp the area in 2002 and
hauled 27,000 tons of sand over from the South Island.

It's practically like walking on the South Island!

Near Civic Square, Wellington.

Civic Square, and Rachel (squint)

A really cool wooden bridge with Maori designs.

People in New Zealand are so polite that they put their graffiti on
sticky labels, so you can just peel it off if you're offended.
How thoughtful.

For Christmas, Rachel got us some nice felt Santa hats
that we wore (for about two minutes while we took pictures).

On the beach on Christmas Day.

Christmas was a weird day for both of us, because:
1. It was warm and sunny outside, and
2. It was warm and sunny ouside.

We spent some of the day talking to our families, and then we went and relaxed on the beach, where every other foreigner who didn't have family in the country was also hanging out. Of course nothing was open, so we couldn't go out to eat, and we were too lazy to cook anything special, but it was still a really nice day. We didn't get nearly as homesick as we thought we might. Again, the warm and sunny thing made it feel not-like-Christmas-at-all.

The Pohutukawa, also known as the New Zealand Christmas Tree,
is everywhere in Wellington (and the rest of NZ) this time of year.

New Zealand loves these vans, and so do I.

Besides having Christmas day off, Rachel and I both worked a lot through the holidays. It was nice to get paid time-and-a-half, especially for holidays like Boxing Day (day after Christmas) which we wouldn't normally celebrate anyway, and therefore didn't mind working.

I did manage to get three days off on the 28th through the 30th so that I could travel up the North Island to Gisborne to go to the Rhythm and Vines music festival (Rachel stayed in Wellington to work). I love music festivals, having already been to two last year, and I wanted to add one more to my list before the year was over. Also, Franz Ferdinand was headlining and most of you probably know how I feel about that band :) A german girl (Heike) we met in Paihia also happened to be heading to the festival, so she and I met up and drove there together.

When we glanced over the road map, we saw two routes to Gisborne that both looked about the same distance. We picked one at random and started out on what was supposed to be a 4 hour drive from Taupo to Gisborne. 7 hours later we finally made it. Tourist Tip #1: When in a hurry and you are faced with two route options, always avoid taking the route that goes through a National Park and has windy, dirt roads. Unless of course you have three extra hours to spare... then totally go for it.

In Te Urewera National Park that we accidently drove through.
Looking out over Lake Waikaremoana.
It's the North Island's deepest lake, and is also considered the country's
"most attractive" lake. Apparently there is someone out there
who knows so much about lakes that he can make that decision.

After our slightly-longer-than-anticipated drive, we made it to Gisborne. The city was very busy and full of people who were getting excited about the festival. This also meant that all the accomodation in the city was full. Heike and I were lucky because some of her friends managed to get us a spot in a campervan park, so we could sleep in Heike's car but still had access to showers and toilets and the like.

The festival was AWESOME, even though it was raining off and on all day long. This was actually a good thing and kept things a bit cooler, because it was 75 degrees even with the sun behind clouds. It did keep me from getting nice clear pictures, but I tried my best...

Jamie Lidell and his band were definitely the best dressed at the festival.

The Kooks had a great show, but I didn't attempt the moshpit
for that one. I wanted to live to see Franz Ferdinand.

When it came time for Franz Ferdinand to appear, I made my way down to the moshpit and got really close to the front, where I befriended some tall guys who offered to take pictures for me. I think they felt bad for me being so impossibly short. I even got onto one guy's shoulders so I could see better, and it was awesome for about ten seconds before the security guards started spraying water in my face. Apparently they don't let you do the shoulder thing... I guess it's not the safest thing to do in a moshpit... yeah it's definitely not safe... I won't do that anymore, now that I think about it...

Slowly getting pushed backwards in the moshpit...

The show was great and a lot of fun. I managed to survive the pit and
live to see a sunny new day in Gisborne.

On the beach in Gisborne.

Heike, the car we slept in, and the beach in the background.

On the drive back from Gisborne to Wellington, we stopped
in Napier for lunch and hung out on a black stone beach...

...and Heike got her first ever speeding ticket.
Apparently in Germany they aren't so strict about speeding...

...then, we got caught in a major rain storm and had to stop
driving for about ten minutes...

... followed by gorgeous clear skies ten minutes after that.

Cruising back into Wellington after a fun festival trip.

New Zealand celebrates New Years before the rest of the world, and
practically a whole day before the USA.
Me and some of my co-workers from
Wagamama celebrating in Civic Square.

Nate from Minnesota texting everyone back home
to let them know what 2009 is like.

Rachel and I happy (clearly) about 2009.

How creative of us.

Some more of my cool co-workers.

New Years eve was really fun and it was great to bring in 2009 with lots of friends, since we couldn't be with our families. Hope everyone else has had a great start to the New Year, and my New Years resolution is to try and blog more often... so... we'll see how that goes :)

Go Wellington.

2008-12-08T23:45:00.000-08:00

Wellington was named in honor of Arthur Wellesley, who was the
first Duke of Wellington in Somerset, England. He was most well-known
for his victory at the Battle of Waterloo, where Napoleon Bonaparte and
his gang were defeated. NZ has very deep historical and political ties with
England, and shares their Queen.

This is a fantastic portrait of Napoleon after his
defeat by that nasty Arthur Wellesley.
Poor downtrodden man.

I reviewed the blog today and felt a little bad that I've barely mentioned the city which Rachel and I have been living in for a whole month already. We have both been working a lot, and the jobs are still going well, but of course this "responsible working adult" thing does manage to get in the way of our being able to experience the city which we will inhabit for another two months.

There is a lot of "we should do this" talk, which is almost always followed up by either:
a) "oh but I have to work," or...
b) "we have two months left, we'll get to that eventually"

Fortunately for us, our friend Elisabeth (from Austria) came along to visit us last week and managed to shake up our schedules and get us to go out and see the city.

Wellington is the capital of New Zealand, and is located at the south-western tip of the North Island. It is also the political center of the country, housing parliament and a lot of the foreign diplomatic missions/embassies. It is also spattered with "heaps" (they use that term a lot here) of cafes and quirky shops. The vibe is totally different to that of Auckland. Locals insist that Auckland is not New Zealand, and that you shouldn't say you've been to NZ unless you've set foot outside of Auckland. Both Rachel and I really prefer Wellington's city atmosphere to Aucklands in that it is a lot more artsy, unique and laid back. While it is called "a city", you don't really feel like you're in one, because if you hop on the bus you are away from the city center within five minutes and in a quieter, hilly suburb.

One more thing you should know about Wellington is that it's called "the windy city," and it most definitely lives up to the nickname. Wind gusts can be extremely powerful, and can come up totally unexpectedly. This brings about difficult decisions when it is raining, because while it might be calm now, you know as soon as you get out your umbrella, the wind will suddenly want to make an appearance. Never have I pulled out an umbrella with more sense of forboding, and never have I thought so cinically about how unrealistic Mary Poppins was in her method of transport...

Supposedly November is the windiest month in Wellington though, and the last week has been much calmer, and so sunny! We just had an excellent Sunday at 73 degrees! Summer is slowly starting to surface, and the summer clothes are in the shops, which is so strange for Nov/Dec, but still just as tempting.

Wellington city from a lookout near where we live in Karori suburb.

Rachel, Elisabeth and I at the lookout.
If you ever go, I recommend facing the
other way (for optimum viewing).

W is for Wellington, Water, Wonder, Whatever...

Tourist photographer's tip #1:
Don't be like us. Avoid direct sun exposure to the eyes.*
*Direct exposure is bad for eyes and could ruin them for future touring/seeing.

Tourist photographer's tip #2:
If you feel like the sun might be too bright, face away immediately.
This should be done even when it means the
background of the picture will not be as cool.

Here in New Zealand, they start teaching their kids
how to play cricket ASAP. My personal reasoning for this is because it's such a
confusing sport that it takes the kids half their lives to understand what's going on.
I'll stick with T-ball thank you...

In the Lady Norwood Rose Garden at the Wellington Botanic Garden.
Definitely go here if you like botany/smelling roses until you feel
a little dizzy and have to sit down.

The rose garden. Photo courtesy of someone else online who either had
access to the roof of a building, or a trampoline maybe?
Anyway, this gives you an idea of how the garden was set up.

Rose, rose, rose, rose, rose, rose, rose,
rose, rose, rose, rose, rose, rose...
There are 9432 roses in this picture.

A candid photo of a staged photo.
Also in this picture: roses.

Familiar?

Me on my day off. At my place of work.

We went out to eat at Wagamama so that Rachel and Elisabeth
could see where I work (and get free drinks and a discount).

It also happened to be Thanksgiving that day, so Elisabeth helped
us celebrate even though she didn't have any nostalgic
commitments to the holiday. Also, Japan helped us celebrate by
contributing its cuisine in place of Turkey and stuffing. Thanks Japan.

Rachel and I got teriyaki chicken. It was good, but it was no turkey.

Well that's it for now, hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving back home, and thanks for checking in on us!

"It's always better on holiday...

2008-11-23T14:35:00.000-08:00

...that's why we only work when we need the money." - Jacqueline, by Franz Ferdinand

Well once again we've let down our avid readers by taking forever to put up a new post. To be fair though, we wouldn't have made a very interesting post a week ago, because we had zero pictures and only a couple of stories about job hunting. As it turns out, we still just have stories about job hunting- but now with real-life color photographs!

The last couple weeks have consisted of Rachel and I getting all moved in to our room at Helen Lowry Hall in Karori, a suburb of Wellington, and then looking for employers that wouldn't mind hiring us for a couple months. Wellington is a definite coffee/tea city, and therefore baristas are in huge demand, especially with the summer months coming up. Those of you who know me also know I do not like coffee, and a job where I would have to make it all day long would be not-so-ideal. Fortunately for Rachel, she holds no unfounded prejudices against coffee, and even had previous experience as a barista. Needless to say, she got a barista job within the first week of our arrival in Wellington. The coffee shop is called Gloria Jean's and is located in downtown Wellington, inside... Borders! Yes, Borders is here in New Zealand too.

My job search took a little longer, but I found a job at a certain restaurant chain that I happen to really enjoy eating at... Wagamama. Fun side note: you might remember that Rachel and I ate at one of these japanese food restaurants in Auckland. See: "Touchdown." Anyway, I am now a "front of house team member" and am in my second week of training to become the best team member Wagamama has ever seen.

Downtown Wellington, near where Rachel works.

Since there's no Thanksgiving here (sad) they really get a jump start
on the Christmas decorations. There was a Christmas Parade last
Sunday, and it didn't feel right that it was so sunny and warm and
everybody (including Santa) had short-sleeves on.

This is Wagamama, where I work. I do not know who the girl is,
but lucky her, she made it into the blog.

Wagamama is right by the water...

...and all the walls are glass...

...so I get to look out at this all day while I work!
It's better in real-life. Much shinier.
And the sunsets in the evening are gorgeous.

Borders! This is important because on the top left side
is where Rachel works in Gloria Jean's.
If you squint you can see her working away...
kidding. She took the picture.

Gloria Jean's coffee shop...

...and a Gloria Jean's worker! Imagine that.

Wagamama "uniform"
Oh and I cut my hair,
it was getting way too long.

We are lucky because we both like our jobs a lot and now we can feel free to spend a little money and to explore Wellington and the surrounding areas in more depth. This should mean that pictures next time will be a little more exciting than just the outsides of buildings that we work in :) We hope that everyone is doing well, and we will be thinking of you all when you celebrate Thanksgiving this week. Maybe we'll cook ourselves a chicken... turkey here is not very good and not very common... probably because it's not very good.

How do you say that again?

2008-11-06T22:26:00.000-08:00

With the Māori people being the native people of
New Zealand, it's natural that the Māori language is used
to name a significant amount of the streets and towns.
For us, however, their elaborate combinations of consonants
and vowels cause apprehensive pauses following phrases such as
"maybe next we should go to ..." or "we had such a good time in ..."

On Friday (the 24th), Rachel and I packed our bags and jumped into a car with three other girls (our Austrian friend Elisabeth included). Despite the really awesome four weeks we'd had in Paihia, the time had come to move on down the north island. Also, the girl with the car was leaving that day- and why take the bus when we could split petrol between five people?

Five people fit in a car just fine. Five people's backpacks and luggage
ADDED to the five people already in the car -definitely pushing it.

We drove to Auckland (about a three and a half hour drive) and stayed the night there so that Rachel and Elisabeth could go see Phantom of the Opera, which was playing at the Civic Theater. Then, after an extremely ridiculous night in a hostel that we do not plan on staying in again any time soon (ask us about it, we'll tell you the whole lovely story), we drove on to Coromandel. This is where Rachel, Elisabeth and I said goodbye to our other travel companions and grabbed a three-bed dorm in a cute little hostel called the Lion's Den for the night.

The next day we looked into going to Hot Water Beach, a place we had heard of that you could dig a whole in the sand and it would fill up with hot water, making your own personal hot tub. Sounds awesome doesn't it? And I'm sure it is, but we didn't get to go.

Turns out Hot Water Beach is actually on the other side of the Coromandel PENINSULA, and that Coromandel town itself really doesn't have anything much to offer. Sadly, we had to forgo our dreams of making our own personal hot tubs and hop on a bus (only two of them were leaving Coromandel that day- it's that small) heading toward Rotorua, with stops in Whitianga (beautiful!) and Thames (not so much). After missing our first bus connection, we got to spend six extra hours in Thames, and I honestly can't remember much of what we did in that time, so it can't have been very special.

Finally, after a weekend that didn't really go as smoothly as we had planned, we made it to Rotorua, where we stayed for four nights and decided to splurge a little and buy a tourist package to go and see a traditional Māori dance and song presentation, as well as have a traditionally cooked Māori meal.

The PHAAAANTOM of the Opera is there- inside your mind.

The sheep require excellent views while they graze.

Coromandel. As you can see there is no Hot Water Beach.
We didn't do anything here besides take this picture
and try to find a bus that would take us somewhere else.
The hostel we stayed at was cool though.

We made it to Rotorua. Getting excited for our night out
experiencing Māori culture, albeit in a very touristy
format that we usually snobbishly try to avoid-- oh who are we kidding?
Being touristy costs money. If we had money, we'd probably be touristy.

Hāngi is an ancient Māori method of cooking food using
heated rocks buried in the ground in a pit oven.

We definitely ate that and it was definitely really really good.

UNPRECEDENTED that we should be walking with a big
group of tourists along the river when a Māori war canoe (Waka) appears!
This sort of thing only happens in dreams, or ancient history, folks.

Performing one of the very cool traditional dances (the Haka) of the Māori people.

A very popular use for some of the haka dances is prior to international
rugby matches. Rugby is HUGELY popular in NZ, and their national team,
the All Blacks, use the dances to intimidate their opponents.
Click here to watch them in all their glory.
I would be very intimidated.

All of the tattoos that the Māori people display on their
face represent different things, usually animals,
water, nature, and other critical components in their lives.
They also are an indicator of status.

I can't remember what he said these stood for,
but I do remember that they were real... ow.

I am the chief.
I have more tattoos than anyone.
And yes, that was my butt you saw in the last picture.

After the Māori experience, our tour guides took us to Rainbow Springs, where we got to see glow worms and the Kiwi bird, both of which are much easier to see in the dark. This means we have no good photos of either one.

I got this photo of a Kiwi by doing a google search.
The Kiwi is the national symbol of New Zealand, and is
also native to the country. The kiwi is a flightless bird that scuttles
around and is much more active at night. They also lay the largest
egg in comparison to their body size. Poor things.

The Kiwi bird is the source for where New Zealanders got their nickname, contrary to the popular belief that Kiwis named themselves after a green piece of fruit.

Rachel on a dock by Lake Rotorua after a walk to see the bubbling mud pools.
Geysers and bubbling mud-pools, as well as hot thermal springs are really common in the Rotorua area.

We celebrated Halloween in excellent backpacker fashion- spending
zero money on costumes and borrowing everything we could.

We met Moses! And... a skeleton..man?

I was from the 80's, Elisabeth was from the 70's,
and Rachel was from the 60's (B.C).

One of the many Jesus figures is lurking behind us.

We stayed in Rotorua for four nights and then moved on to Taupo, where we stayed just one night to see the scenery, and then we parted ways with Elisabeth :( and Rachel and I took the six hour bus ride down to Wellington, where we had cheap accommodation waiting for us.

McDonald's in Taupo is FIRST CLASS.

I completely agree with their policy. This is where we always
get food when we can, it's kind of like Costco.

I just liked this roundabout.

For the next few months, Rachel and I will be living (and working) in Wellington. We have an extremely cheap room to live in at one of the residence halls for Victoria University. It was just the last week of school before summer vacation here, so we get to live in the dorms while all the students are gone. We'll update you on Wellington and the jobs in our next post, and thanks as always for reading! We miss you all, you can put a ring around that.

It's Reinga time.

2008-10-26T03:34:00.000-07:00

As promised, here are the pictures from our awesome road trip to Cape Reinga, the north-western-most point on the North Island in New Zealand. Note: If you don't like pictures, this is not the post for you.

The first time we had to use a petrol station in NZ.

The drive along the coast was gorgeous.

Destination Cape Reinga. Notice the car
driving on the left-hand side.

90 Mile beach. Apparently not actually 90 miles, but 88 kilometers(what?).
The reason for this exaggeration is unknown. I was just happy to see use of
imperial units, as the metric system is the norm here.

90 Mile (only not really) beach.

This guy could care less about the warnings, he had an appointment
to get to and no "hazardous" beach could stop him.

The car that made it all happen.
A co-worker of our friend Rike kindly
loaned it to us for the day. An exceptionally bold
move, considering it would be 2 Americans, a German
and an Austrian driving it, all of whom are used to driving
on the other side of the road.

We stopped along the way to try sand surfing on the sand dunes.

Rachel and Rike displaying our newly rented sand boards.

Thanks to another random sand surfer for this lovely photo.

Enjoying the sun and thinking about maybe trying to surf down a dune.

Rachel and Elisabeth hiking up the giant (and windy) slope.
I'm relaxed because it's not my turn yet.

She did it!

Me too!

This is actually a fake, I was holding on
for dear life on the actual ride down.

Eating kiwifruit after a good sand surf.

They have annoying road construction in New Zealand too.

Our final stop was at Cape Reinga and the Cape Reinga Lighthouse.
The cape is the northernmost point in NZ.

The lighthouse.

Cape Reinga is considered the separation marker between the
Tasman Sea and the Pacific Ocean. You can see something called
the "tidal race" as the two seas merge just off the coast.
That's what all the rough white patches of water are.

Someone graffitied the sign just to show they're not afraid.
I was afraid and I just used the zoom to get this close.

Rachel driving on the left side! She doesn't even look phased.

It was a great road trip and the perfect way to see the outskirts of New Zealand without having to board a cramped tour bus. More road trips to come soon, but until then, thanks so much for checking in on us and as always we'd love to hear from you!

Still alive!

2008-10-22T21:36:00.000-07:00

What? When you have a blog you’re supposed to update it occasionally? Ok sorry. We’ll work on that.

It’s hard to believe we’ve already been in New Zealand for a month! The last few weeks have been busy and a ton of fun (hence the lack of blog updates). As you probably already know, we have been cleaning in exchange for accommodation at the Saltwater Lodge in Paihia, but since that only takes up a couple of hours each morning, we then have the rest of the day to explore the town…

Our friend Rike got a job as a bartender and will
now be staying in Paihia for the summer.

Us, in our usual jovial moods. Hiking one of the
many scenic trails around the town.

At the top of the trail, looking out onto the Bay of Islands.

The beauty was all around us, we didn't
know which way to look.

Live music jam session every Sunday
night at The Beach House. Anyone can grab their
bongos or tambourines and join in.
We just watched.

Gareth. He manages the Saltwater Lodge where we live.
He couldn't "manage" to stop me taking this picture though.
I told him it would end up on our blog, and he now
looks forward to being famous amongst our family and friends.

Rachel on another scenic hike.

Rachel and I with friends Elisabeth and Rike, maybe
you recognize them by now?

Another candid and jovial photo.
We went to a house party at a co-worker of Rike's.

"Should we make funny faces?"

"No, just smile."

Gareth's wife Lucy asked us (and fellow cleaner Nina) to be
models for the new Saltwater Lodge brochure. Because we are both rather
short (and therefore unlikely candidates for modeling) we did not want
to pass on this once in a lifetime opportunity.
Note: It is the law to wear helmets when biking in New Zealand.

Working our magic.

Lucy rewarded our hard work with a bottle of wine,
straight from a vineyard in the Bay of Islands.

On a boat ready to go... PARASAILING.

Smiling like it's no big deal we're about to go 800 ft in
the air with only a cable attached to reel us back in.

Nervous laughter.

The view was awesome!

They dip your feet in the water, just to freak you out.

Still alive.
So much fun!

Along with all the parasailing and other fun activites, on Wednesday Rachel and I went with Rike and Elisabeth on a road trip to the farthest northern point of the North Island. It was an awesome day, but since we have so many pictures in this post, I think we’ll wait a day or two and update you on that adventure later. So thanks for reading/looking and check back soon!

It's PaihIA, not PaihAI.

2008-10-05T20:23:00.000-07:00

It's been about a week since we last updated our blog, and since then we have left behind the big city and traveled up north to a small town in the Bay of Islands called Paihia. This was a welcome change, because we (being small-town girls) were getting a bit tired of the hustle and bustle of Auckland. And the city life wasn't exactly what we came to New Zealand for anyway.

Paihia, besides being difficult to pronounce, is also difficult to get to in an inexpensive fashion. We had to take an InterCity Bus from Auckland center, and while it was great to see the beautiful countryside- the stuffiness, the seats in the back of the bus, and the windy roads were not helpful for two girls prone to carsickness. It's unfortunate that New Zealand doesn't offer a lot of alternative transportation between small towns, so if you don't own a car (like us) it is usually either a bus or hitch-hiking (not recommended), and the bus transportation isn't cheap. In the future, we are planning on either renting or buying a car, because it is much more practical. Even if it means we'll have to adjust to driving on the other side of the road.

We got into Paihia after four hours on the bus, and had a short walk (with our roller suitcases) to the hostel where we will be spending four weeks cleaning for a couple hours a day in exchange for accommodation. There are a ton of Backpackers hostels in Paihia because the town is a central hub for the Bay of Islands (a popular tourist destination because of the fishing, boating, and dolphin tours). As a tourist town, there are bound to be many great and dramatic descriptions trying to lure in the toursists. Here's just one example, from one of the brochures here:

"Whether your interest is culture, fine dining, adventure, or the enjoyment of our shimmering waters, superb beaches and abundant wildlife, you will find it here in Paihia, the friendly centre of your Far North experience."

We have yet to see the abundant wildlife, but the rest sounds about right.

Saying goodbye to Auckland.

Our room at the Saltwater Lodge.
A Kiwibird (to add that NZ touch).

The Saltwater Lodge, where we will be
living for the next few weeks. It is a five star hostel,
and the cleanest one either of us has ever stayed in!

The Reception office at the Saltwater Lodge.

The beach is just down the road from our hostel.

This is my normal stance.

We found seashells. That was fun.

Yes, I'll have a Rachel on the rocks please.

Kara, Rachel, Elisabeth(the Austrian), and Rike(the German).
These two were our roommates in the Saltwater
and we have become very good friends. They are sticking around
in Paihia for the next month as well.

We went on a hike with Elisabeth and Rike and
encountered this crazy tree. Naturally, we had to climb it.

We also encountered a Kiwi man hiking along and
made him take this picture for us.

Eating Fish and Chips!
10% Fish
20% Fries
70% SALT
=
100% Awesome.

Rachel walking down a street in Paihia.

A really common sort of "pine tree" that
we see a lot here.

Oh yes she did.
Rachel singing a Grease medley with
DJ Ted on Karaoke night at Salty's Bar, which is
where our friend Rike works.

Neither of them had ever heard of
Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, so we bought
them some and they are now fans.

If they never learn a thing about Kiwi culture, at least
they know about Peanut Butter and its popularity in America, right?

So far our stay here as been a lot of fun, and also pretty relaxing. We hope to rent a car in the coming week or two and drive up to the farthest point of the North Island, called Cape Reinga. There are also a lot of boat tours here, and the skydiving is supposedly cheaper than anywhere else in New Zealand. I doubt I will be able to work up the courage to do it, but maybe Rachel will... that's it for now- thanks again to everyone for reading and commenting, we love to hear from you all!

Auckland Amusements

2008-09-27T01:17:00.000-07:00

I had no idea this was in New Zealand.

We haven't even been in New Zealand for one week yet, but we feel like a lot has happened in that amount of time. Our days consist mostly of sightseeing around Auckland, finding food and keeping Rachel hidden from her new (and a little too old) admirer that lives down the hallway in our hostel. Of the twenty something guests staying here at the moment, 90% of them are middle-aged bachelors from various countries, all of whom consider themselves to be more than "eligible." As of yet, we haven't taken them up on any offers so no need to worry (moms, dads, etc).

Outside of the hostel, we have had many great adventures. The other day we walked to the Auckland War Memorial Museum and looked through some of the exhibits there. Besides the war exhibits, there were the Māori Culture and Volcano exhibits that were pretty interesting. The Māori people are the native people of New Zealand and about every 1 in 7 people here are of Māori ethnicity. We spent quite a bit of time looking through those exhibits, learning more about New Zealand's history and contemporary culture. The Volcano exhibit was awesome, and focused a lot on the volcanoes/volcanic activity that surrounds Auckland City. Rangitoto is the most recently active volcano, it erupted just about 600 years ago. Not expected to erupt again for another several thousand years, so that's good. Really good, considering we just hiked to its summit today. Unfortunately, we didn't get to spend much time in the actual war memorial exhibits of the museum, because it was closing by the time we made it to them. Some other time perhaps.

Auckland War Memorial Museum.

Only in New Zealand would a cow skeleton constitute a Museum exhibit.

Maori Masks.

Duh.

Today we took a ferry over to Rangitoto Island (as previously mentioned) and hiked to the summit of the volcano. It had a great view of Auckland city, and we had a lot of fun hiking and chatting with a British girl who is also travelling on holiday.

Devonport Island.

Hiking to Rangitoto Summit. Photo courtesy Rachel.

At least it's not certain.

At the summit.

Auckland City from Rangitoto.

Artistic.

Capture the dream!

We also finally have a mobile phone here, complete with a New Zealand number. At last, we can contact people locally. It's also free (for us) to receive calls from the States, so if you want our number, ask and you shall receive. This phone thing has helped in planning and organizing the next phase of our journey. More to come on that soon. Thanks for reading and if you have comments, don't be shy!

A poster of the Auckland Rugby team signed by a bunch of its players.
We didn't actually meet them ourselves, but still cool. Given to us by the
hostel manager Wendy, because she likes us so much.

Touchdown.

2008-09-23T15:21:00.000-07:00

Well it's official. We love New Zealand.

Our airplane. Under Quantas it says "Spirit of Australia."
We did not fly to Australia so we don't know if this claim is true.

After a long (12 hours) day of flying, we landed in Auckland at 4:45 AM on Sunday the 21st, which is quite the adjustment considering we left on Friday night. Because of the time change we ended up skipping most of Saturday, which basically means we lost a day of our lives, but we should get that back on the return flight, so it's all good.

Upon arrival in Auckland, we picked up our baggage and made it through customs pretty quickly and with no problems. We had heard that customs could be kind of a hassle, and they are very strict about any food, water or soil making it into the country, but we passed with flying colors.
After customs we caught a bus into Auckland City Center and missed our stop, so we got to be really obvious tourists and lug our (rather large) roller suitcases up a (rather large) hill. Luckily, it was 6 in the morning so not too many people were around to witness this.

Our very sketchy elevator up to our hostel
(with manual doors that we get to open and close ourselves).

It is Tuesday afternoon here currently, and in the past two days we have been busy exploring the city and getting all of our necessary paperwork together so that we will eventually be able to work. Everywhere we go, people are very very nice, helpful, and laid back. It was kind of surprising to us that we were able to apply for an Inland Revenue Number (the equivalent of a Social Security Number) without any real address or contact information other than our emails!

This is Rachel standing in downtown Seattle- I mean Auckland.

The Sky Tower in the background is a broadcasting facility and is the
largest building in the southern hemisphere. Resembles the space needle.

Auckland Harbour. Auckland is known as "The city of a thousand sails."
We saw at least two.

A view of the Ferry Building on the Pier.

Yeah. We thought the red fence was cool.

4 Million People.
$100,000.
1 Winner.
DRAMATIC.

In New Zealand, when you order a 'small' drink, that is actually what you get.

I got to eat at Wagamama! Very exciting. I got Cha Han (of course).
It's a Japanese food chain that's popular in Europe and NZ.

Rachel has a new-found appreciation for Wagamama.

Now that we have most of our paperwork and prepping done, we are going to take the next few days to check out some of the sights in Auckland. Tomorrow we are going to take a ferry over to Rangitoto Island and hike a volcano. We will try to update again soon! Thanks everybody for your comments, we love to hear from you.

Flight #26, New Zealand bound

2008-09-19T17:09:00.000-07:00

Well, we finally have our blog up, after months and months of planning and preparation for our trip to New Zealand. It's been two years since Rachel and I looked at each other and said "hey... we should go to New Zealand!" And look at us, we actually did it! We said our goodbyes to friends and family, and right now we are sitting in the LA international airport, waiting to board our flight to Auckland. We wanted to keep this blog so that anyone who cares can check up on our adventures as we travel around the country. We will try our hardest to update often! Between the two of us, hopefully it will work out, just as long as we can find internet... that's it for now... see you on the flip side (says Rachel)!