New Zealand (and Australia)

I have safely arrived in Australia, but before I talk about that I need to talk about New Zealand.

Me and my sister Liz left July 4th and headed to Los Angeles, where we boarded Air New Zealand and headed for Auckland New Zealand. After the twelve hour flight we landed in New Zealand around seven in the morning on Tuesday July 6. From there we took a bus into the city. We had just gotten off the bus and were trying to cross a street and it said 6 seconds to cross. I said "WE CAN MAKE IT!" Liz started running across, and well then I started to run too. But as I did the wheels of my luggage lost contact with the wet slick pavement and I found myself unable to run and carry luggage at the same time. When I attempted to regain contact between the wheels of my bag and the ground, I tripped myself. As I went down, my laptop slipped off the top of my wheeler bag. I fell on my left side, my left arm reaching out, and my laptop went under me and on the slick pavement served as a bodyboard that sent my sliding. I landed there, my arm outstretched, crying "LIZ LIZ HELP HELP!" By this time the six seconds were long gone and the cars (and people) were staring at this drama in the intersection. We couldn't help but laughing as we picked up my scattered belongings and continued down the road. We checked into our room at the Nomad's Fat Camel, and interesting backpacking hostel. We attempted to stay awake the rest of the day to get on New Zealand time, which meant we wandered around Auckland like Zombies. We managed to stay up till 7 when we got a free meal from Nomad's of bangers and mash. Then after being awake fore more than 40 hours we went to sleep.

On Wednesday July 7th we took a bus from Auckland to Wellington, where we stayed in a 8-share room in the famous (or infamous) Waterloo Hotel. We both decided that sharing a room with six other strangers (most of which we didn't see but just heard them snoring) was not really our cup of tea.

On Thursday we took a bumpy ferry ride across Cook Strait and landed in Picton where we were met by my mom's cousin Mitch and his wife Deb. We had lunch with their daughter Shannon and her two kids Giovanna and Noah. From we spent the night at Mitch and Deb's and on Friday went to Arapawa Island! There we stayed with Mary, my mom's cousin. We took a walk around the island where we saw the Arapawa goats!

The cold night at Arapawa was eased by our new found friend: The Hottie. Also known as the Hot Water Bottle, while we had heard of such a thing, we had never really used them before to keep warm at night. We both agree its something we are going to have use when winter comes around to the states.

After spending the weekend down in the Marlborough Sounds, we head to Christchurch with Pam, our second cousin! First we stopped off in Kaikoura where we saw fur seals. In christchurch we took a Gondola ride and saw some breathtaking views of the Southern Alps. We made smores at the Sign of the Bellbird. On our last night in Christchurch we went to Willowbank Wildlife Reserve where we got to see some native (and introduced) New Zealand wildlife. The highlight of course being the kiwi bird! Very strange creatures! We also learned a bit about Moari Culture.
On thursday we take a lovely train ride back to Picton, though i was so tired I slept through most of it. And there we made our way back up to Auckland the same way we came, not the most efficient route but it suited us just fine.

From Auckland I had only a three hour flight to Brisbane where I caught a ride to my apartment adjacent to The University and I am now getting settled!

So far 2 of my three roommates have moved in. The one is from Germany, the other I haven't seen much of yet, and the third is Australian and will be arriving in a couple of days.

Tomorrow Orientation starts and I'm excited to see more of this new and vast country and get to meet new people!

-Suz