Church is not a big deal in NZ and neither is God but they sure do take their holidays seriously. For Easter I got Friday, Monday and Tuesday off. And they call Monday Easter Monday. On Monday, Friday and Sunday they charge 15 percent surcharge due to the holiday. It is defitnley interesting on the holidays. So for this odd but great holiday break we went to the north of the island. It was Rebecca from Germany and I. On friday we waited for the bus until we realized there was none. Then we asked someone hey are the busses coming? And it was two twin guys that go to University also and they started laughing and said no but we can give you a ride to the bus station. So it was ours and there first hitchiking expeirence. But not really hitchhiking. Then when we got to the station we took a bus to Auckland which is about two hours. On the bus I met a girl who was 17 and riding with her boyfriend back home. She lives in a car but a very nice car that speaks to you to even open the doors. She used to live on a farm and herded sheep. She was the most interesting character. If you thought I was a hippy I did not even compare to her! She was writing a childrens book about fairies and little witches. It was so interesting to hear her talk about her life.
Then we took another bus to Paihia which was about another 5 hours. We got to paihia at about 7 pm. When we got there we went to a place which we thought we booked to stay and then we realized that it did not go through. So we searched for a place to stay for a good hour. When we found a place it was on the otherside of the bay and the lady said if you wanto get there you need to RUN literally RUN to the ferry and then it is a twenty minute walk. So we ran a good five minutes with our big tourist backpacks on all the way to the ferry. We ended up at a backpackers in Russell which use to be the capital of NZ at one point. Now the town is really small and just a fishing area.
The backpackers is house that the owners live in and they have backpackers stay with them. Some of them stay there long term to work also. It was very fun to stay there because everyone was on an adventure and there were so many people on their own just passing through. We stayed there friday and sunday night. (saturday we got kicked out because it was all ready booked but that story coming soon.) So there were some swedish girls that were backpacking through Asia, Australia and then NZ and it has been 3 mos and this was their last stop. Then some German girls who were living there to make money and then travel. And one of the nights an older couple stayed at the hostel in the couple room not the bunks that would be bad for health. There were a retired English couple. It was so fun to have them sit and talk to all of us who are all kind of just winging it. They stayed up telling us about England until about 11:30. So if you are reading this and you are older and travel you should go to a backpackers! It is really interesting and super duper fun.
Then Saturday we went to the Watangi Treaty grounds. It is where the treaty between the Maori tribes and the Pakia (white people) came together. But the Maori and Pakia still have issues with the treaty to this day. It has lots of history in the musuem. The museum is on the beach. And there is a Maori prayer house and canoe and an English house. We went on a tour and one of the Maori people told us about the plants. There is one plant that we call flax that they use to make skirts for the kabbakah. (that is what I went to earlier and have a picture of it in my blog from earlier.) After that we went to the beach and just chilled out there. The beach is so awesome because it right on the grass. It is amazing. Later that night we went to the one pub in town and watched the locals.
On Sunday we woke up early and went to the most north part of the island. It was a tour. We first walked through this forest on the way there. Then we drove about 4 hours and got to the tip of the island. At the tip is where the Tasman and pacific ocean meet. It is so radical to watch. The water is extremely blue. We got to swim in the ocean. There are sand dunes right on one part of the beach. We went boogie boarding down the dunes. It was really fun to go down but it was quite the hike to go up them so we did not do it to many times. Then the bus drove on the 90 mile beach. (It is actually a 60 mile beach). We drove on the beach and then stopped at one spot and got some food. The tour guide caught live mussels and some of us tried them. Free sushi! It was pretty sick, as in gross not cool. The whole trip took up most of the day. Once we were back we bought some ice cream. I have been craving cold stone type of ice cream. All the ice cream here is just all ready made, you can not choose every ingredient.
On Monday we made our way home to Hamilton. We woke up at 6AM to walk a good 2K to the ferry and then catch the ferry at 7 AM. Then we caught the bus at eight AM and it was a seven hour bus ride home. The girl that sat behind us puked. So the bus smelled yummy the whole day!
The next week my head started itching a lot! I realized that I got head lice from the hostels. So if you stay in the hostels then you need to have your own pillowcase! It was a pain the funnybone to get it out. But now it is gone. ANd on the next hostel trip I am going to make sure to bring my own pillowcase.
Happy belated easter to all!
No comments:
Post a Comment