Blog-ity blog blog

HELLO!

ROAR!

Bet you are surprised to hear from me. It's been a while.

Well my lovelies, I haven't been up to too much. Auckland was rainy for a couple days and I was nursing an ouchie foot/leg and sunburn so I stayed inside for a day or two. When I did get out, it was just to wander with some friends from the hostel and their other random friends. Generally I've been out walking for at least 7 hours a day and doing a random activity as well. For instance, I played 36 holes of mini golf against Richard and Jolan (a Swiss guy who showed up at the hostel a couple days ago). On the first 18 holes I totally kicked butt and placed 2nd of 3 by only 1 point. Richard  took the win (and good thing too cause he's a self-proclaimed "sore loser" and I got a hint of his wrath when I drained a couple hole in ones haha). Hmmmmmmmm, other than that it's been a slow couple days. I went to an outdoor fair called the Greylyn Festival with lots of live music, and shops and stuff. Then I hit a couple house parties and the bar. Thankfully my friends from the hostel aren't really big drinkers so we just ran around and had basically sober fun. I also met a super sweet guy from Canada named Joe. Classic! Oh! Did I tell you I went swimming in the ocean? That was cool...

Ok! So let's talk about now since I can't remember the past. I've got a job in Leigh (see pics) doing a bathroom renovation and whatever else my lovely host asks me too do. I came up here yesterday. Remco was kind enough to drive me the hour long ish journey though we made it into a day trip. We stopped at a couple beaches and regional parks. It was absolutely beautiful. We climbed a mountain like thinger, more like a beach cliff. Gosh. We just wandered so many beaches and such an insane amount of beautiful countryside. It's really too much for words.

Today I got up and had breakfast and started sanding down the walls in the bathroom. The old whatever had been torn off the walls and all that remained was rough plaster and this brown oozey looking stuff. It took me about and hour and a half to get it in tip top shape. As I was cleaning up, Cath (the lady I'm staying with) came running in looking a touch frantic and yelled at me to come quickly there were dolphins at the beach! We jumped in the car, drove 4 blocks, and got out to see about 20 dolphins in the bay. They were swimming within 20 feet of the beach. It was absolutely incredible. I waded in a bit and they continued to swim close to the beach. Two swam by me about 10 feet away. There were two ladies swimming when the dolphins first came in and they were so close that I swear they could touch them. I was so jealous. Cath took a ton of pictures of the whole thing but as we were leaving she realized that there was no memory card in the camera so there's no record of the whole thing (other than in my head). Which I suppose is record enough. When we got back to the house, we had lunch and then tore out the bathtub. That was pretty cool. Just me and this wicked awesome lady I met less than 24 hours ago taking a crow bar to a bar tub. Fun times for sure! After that I filled some wholes in the wall, vacuumed up all the mouse droppings from where the tub had been and blitzed down to the beach to shower in the ocean! The water is WAY saltier than I ever expected and I love it. I did some tanning at the beach too and then after drying in the sun I went on a 5km walk to Goat Island Marine Reserve (it's a regional park type thing with a gorgeous beach and kayaking! I'm hoping I can kayak with some hostel friends this weekend). The walk down to Goat Island was incredible. The sun was literally streaming from the sky (see pics for reference) and everything was so vibrant looking. I finally rolled back into town around 7, had dinner, watched tv, put up pics on FB and wrote this blog. I suspect tomorrow with be very similar to today. Hopefully it will anyway.

I would like to close this blog with a 10 Things I Know About New Zealand list
1. Every outlet has an on/off switch
2. The colours here are so ridiculously bold it makes your head spin
3. The sun is completely here different than in Canada
4. Kiwi's are the nicest people!
5. My hostel (K Road City Travellers in Auckland) was the best hostel in the Auckland area
6. Beaches are everywhere and are definitely not created equal
7. There are way too many hills in this country (Love it!)
8. The dolphins are as friendly as the people
9. The roads are a billion times better than the ones in Saskatchewan
10. New Zealand rocks my socks

The End and Goodnight.
Julia