Asia, take two. What a long day! I woke up at 3:30am to take the shuttle to the airport. I got to Melbourne around 8am, just in time to sit at the airport for five hours. Ahhh, airport fun! So what do I do in an international airport with five hours to kill? Coffee, sudoku, reading the Financial Times, Wii Sports in the electronics shop, Jelly Belly pear jelly beans, pretend shopping, reading, pancakes with maple syrup, 1/2 hour Internet, more Wii, and suddenly it seemed like I was being rushed onto the plane. ;) An hour into my JetStar Read more…

I slept in this morning, before heading to the Auckland airport for my flight down to Christchurch. I took the $5 bus into town. It’s kind of nice visiting the same town again. I know where everything is and it’s all so easy on the second loop through. I walked to Pac’n Save to get three boxes of muesli (granola) bars for SE Asia, did some last minute errands, did laundry, and then packed for Thailand. Farewell New Zealand. I’ll miss you.

I never give big cities a chance. After breakfast, I walked down to the docks to see if there were any spots on the ferry left to Waiheke Island. There was still room on the 10am ferry, so I ran back to the hostel and grabbed my backpack. First, I took the bus around the island, and then went back to the town center, where I looked at shops, walked through the art gallery, stopped at the info center for a map and the bus schedule and then got wedges at a cafe. For the afternoon, I decided to walk Read more…

I had breakfast at Replete Food and people watched. I could totally live here. After checking out of the hostel, I wandered around, and did some shopping. I ended up buying a blue tank top and a hat (for Thailand) at a surf shop. At noon, I caught the Stray bus headed to Auckland. I officially hate cities. I’m feeling a little down this evening. It’s raining, I’m tired, I’m alone in a big city, and I’m leaving New Zealand in two days. This happens every now and then, but I’m totally in a funk this evening.

We booked a tour to the Wai-o-tapu Thermal Wonderland for this morning. It was fantastic. I took way too many pictures of boiling mud, the geyser, sulphur pits etc. Nerd day out! Seriously, though, it was great. After the bubbling mud, we stopped at the geyser. Oh and buzz kill, they put soap in the geyser at 10:15 every morning, which is why it’s on a precise schedule. After watching the geyser, we did the 1 1/2 hour walk through the “wonderland,” before heading back to Rotorua. We grabbed lunch a cafe and then watched Whale Rider, a movie about Read more…