After a very long few days of travel (4 hours Minneapolis to San Fran, 7 hour layover, 12.5 hours to Aukland, NZ, 2 hour layover, and 1.5 hours to Christchurch, plus several hours of driving in NZ) I am finally in the land of the Kiwi's!!! Let me tell you, it is absolutely beautiful!! From the hostel we are staying in I can see beautiful mountains and the ocean, and if we look at the right time supposedly we will be able to see whales and dolphins in the water!!
We got in to Aukland at 4:30ish in the morning New Zealand time, then arrived in Christchurch about 8:30, and let me tell you my body was confused. They served us breakfast in the last part of our flight to aukland so by the time we reached Christchurch we were all ready for some lunch...at the Kiwi's typical breakfast hour, but we're acclimating and so "no worries!". We got in, our leader Joe and one of the student's bags didn't make it but are supposed to arrive tomorrow, so no big deal! We all made it through customs and got in our rental vans and drove around Christchurch and up to another town to go to a local market and to get some lunch (I'm sure the name will come right back to me after I post this), then back to Christchurch to go to the beach to watch some sand volleyball. Unfortunately it was a little rainy and a bit chilly (but still much better than home!) so we didn't stick around the beach too long, and we got in the vans for our drive up to Kaikoura. The drive took us through mountains and along the ocean, seeing many different trees, and types of vegetation, as well as many sheep, a bunch of cows, and a few horses too (I saw some jumping type stuff set up and kind of want to try my hand at a new zealand horse). Towards the end of the drive it was really twisty and right along the cliffs down to the ocean and we had a little hairy moment when there was a huge semi tailgating us down these narrow twisty NZ roads, but Joe pulled over and let him pass and it was all good! Totally weird driving on the left side of the road, by the way!
Our hostel in Kaikoura (Dolphin Lodge) is simple, but has quite possibly one of the most gorgeous views I have ever seen! An intense game of wiffle ball before dinner, overlooking mountains and the ocean, and a relaxing soak in the hot tub (to get out all the aches of travel, my back was definitely a hurting unit) rounded out the evening, a quick shower, a check of the email and blog entry and I'm about ready to head towards bed. Tomorrow we're just chilling in Kaikoura, maybe hitting the beach, we were going to swim with dolphins but the place is completely booked because this is big tourism season for them, so I think we're just going to take it easy and recoup from the trip.
I hope everyone is having a great start to their new year!! Leave me some comments, or shoot me an email or facebook message!!! I wish you all could see this, if you ever get the opportunity to come to New Zealand, even from what I've seen in less than 24 hours, jump at the chance, you will not regret it!!!!
<3 <3 <3
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
sounds amazing, my dear!
ReplyDeletelet's just add a few weeks to our tentative summer 2011 European trip, and swing by Australia and New Zealand! :)
So I say to Gary, Lizzie is in NZ. He says, "That's progress. That is whre she is supposed to be."
ReplyDeleteNZ si a beautiful place. And they have lots of sheep. Wonder if the nephew would take up farming there...LOL! Let us know how swiming with the dolphins goes. Kathy V. got to do that last year and said it was quite amazing.
Here we have a nice coating of ice again so we will stay busy trying to stay in an up right position.