Auckland

Hey Everyone,

I am in Wellington now, my home city for the next 4 and a half months! Sorry for this being my first post after the 6 days I've been here. But we got to Auckland last Wednesday, and we hit the ground running. There were 17 other Americans with me in the orientation, one from Purdue. The internet was also crappy which made it hard to sit down and write. so here has been my adventures since then...

The first day we went out in the city and walked around on a short tour. Auckland is a very cool city that can be the epitome of kiwi culture. It's a very modern city on the waterfront and the air is very clean. Kiwis are incredibly nice (kiwis are New Zealand people for those who don't know) and very accepting of the American people. But anyway, the first day was just introductions and seeing the city and a hike. We went up to Northhead hill, I think it was called, and it was a hill that overlooks the city. In WWII, the Kiwi's thought they would be attacked so they decided to build 6 cannons... yes 6 cannons to prevent attack. Not the greatest strategy but hey, whatever they want. Then after the hike we sat down in a park and ate some traditional Kiwi sandwiches. Don't ask me what was in them but they were good. Here are a few pictures...

The second day, we got up and headed for a Maori (pronounced mow-di) crash course. The Maori culture is the indigenous people of New Zealand and they are an extremely interesting culture. We got to go to a hill that is kind of like a Maori National Park and has many historical meanings to the Maori people. But after we went to "One Tree Hill" we made our way to the Auckland museum. In the museum there were a lot of Maori artifacts, houses, boats, weapons, etc. Then the highlight of the day is when we went to the world famous black sand beach of Piha and he Lion's Head. It was amazing, the water was semi-warm but we couldn't go in past our thighs because the rip tides there are so strong that the lifeguard saves around 20 people a day in the summer. These tides make CA rip tides look like pansies. But we got to explore a little bit and see the caves and animals of Piha, which all the pictures are of...

the rock on the right of the picture is Lion's Head rock. When there was a war brewing, the tribe who lived in the hills of this part of the country would send their princess to the rock for safety. When the tribes wared, they would try to capture the princess sometimes but never hurt her. She would always be treated as a princess, but she would be forced to marry her family's murders. Rumor has it that if the attacking tribe tried to climb the rock, the princess would jump off and kill herself.

The third day in Auckland was awesome! We woke up early and drove 3 hours south of Auckland and went black water rafting in caves. And in the caves are the world famous glow worms. You can google it but it was a 3 hour tour and we got in an extra warm wetsuit, and tube to raft in, and a helmet with a light on it. We jumped off waterfalls with the tubes and got to float along 65 meters under ground in the caves. The water was freezing but it was awesome. There aren't any pictures from there because it was wet and we wouldn't have been able to hold the cameras and the tubes. The eels probably would have been bothered by the flash too.

this is before we went into the caves.

The fourth day we were there we got to have a day to ourselves. So we went to an island called Wihekie (I think that's the spelling) and just got some beer, some fishing equipment, and hung out at the beach. Some people went to a winery but we decided to see the beaches of the island. Some people also rented scooters for the day, but most of us were scared because the driving is so different here, being on the left side of the road. But all in all, Auckland wasn't real NZ but it was a lot of fun. I ended up going out 5 out of 5 nights in Auckland, more than any one of my peers, and I have yet to taste a bad NZ beer. I am in Wellington now and will tell you more about Welly soon because its the greatest city in the world.

-Karl