A new found love for camping!

...well camping on the beaches of beautiful New Zealand, at least! I am so refreshed and happy after the most incredible vacation of my life!!! Last Friday, me and 5 others rented a van and took a trip to the Coromandel Peninsula. There were 2 more groups of people that were also renting vehicles, but because some people still had class on friday, we all left at different times with then intentions of meeting up later. I was in the green machine/mystery van with 5 super chill people which were Vic (who's actually from Pewaukee), Brianna (goes to UWM), Kacey, Mike, and Elza (our lovely Latvian friend). Mike was driver and Vic was designated navigator. We called the duo Michael Vic :P We took a little break in a town called Thames and had to decide where we were headed after that, as we had several great options. We mutually agreed on heading to the very tip of the peninsula where we heard there were some great secluded beaches. The trip up there was breathtaking...both in the respect that it was beautiful driving along the coast, and also because it was slightly terrifying driving along cliffs on the most curvy roads I've ever been on. We took a picture stop to take in the amazing scenery, and then headed back up the coast where the road became gravel, and there were no longer two set lanes. We made it to our campsite just in time to watch the sunset, which I was grateful that we didn't have to drive on those crazy roads at night, and watching the sun fall behind the mountainous green hills was absolutely remarkable. Between the six of us, we had a three person tent and 2 large tarps. Brianna, Vic, and Elza claimed the tent which left Mike, Kacey and me to create a makeshift tent with the tarps. It looked pretty ridiculous from the outside, but seriously, you can't judge a book by it's cover because it kept us warm and completely dry even though it rained pretty hard at night. We made a campfire, toasted some sandwiches, and busted out the guitars for awhile before playing a very amusing game of charades. There were a couple intermissions when we ran down to the ocean and frolicked on the beach and danced around with our homemade sparklers. As surreal and fairytaleesque as it all sounds...it really was.

We awoke the next day to rain and a cycling race. As scary as it was driving on those nasty roads the day before, the intensity of it all was trifold having to drive around all the cyclists (we learned it was a 700 person race), while also attempting to bid clear of the cliffs. A few miles into the trip, we noticed a guy leaning over a cliff with a bicycle next to him, and Bri noticed a man at the bottom. We stopped to see if help was needed, and apparently the guy had been riding too close to the edge and just fell off the vertical drop. I guess he was alright, which I still don't know how that's possible, but they just wanted a blanket for him, so Elza sacrificed one of hers, and then we were back on the road. It was probably another 20 minutes until we saw (and almost had a head-on collision with) the ambulence. We finally made it to Hot Water Beach, but only stayed long enough for Mike to befriend some very chill and helpful Kiwis who led us to, yet another magical, and secluded beach. It was only about a 10 minute drive, and when we found the Lonely Bay that we were in search of, we weren't too discouraged by the "No Camping No Fires" sign. As they say..."When in...New Zealand!" So we camped there (and obviously made a fire). Another perfect night with the chillest group of people.


Day 3 and we wanted some real food, so we went in to town with Nina's Cafe as our destination (thanks to the trusted Lonely Planet book). Unfortunately, we had a leisurely start to our morning/afternoon, and they had already closed the kitchen. So we went to the next place on the list, which was a great restaurant known for their pizzas. We came with big appetites, and each left with half our pizzas. Our next stop was back to Hot Water Beach where we layed in little pools of intensely hot water that's naturally heated from the ground. Apparently, we just missed one of our other groups that we never ended up meeting up with because everyone's phones had died. The tides started coming in, and it was our cue to head home. On the way back, as the sun was setting and all was peaceful, we were blessed with the perfect ending. It was the brightest rainbow I had ever seen, placed perfectly amidst the hills, ocean, and setting sun. Words, nor pictures can ever describe the beauty of it.

Hot Water Beach-courtesy of Kacey Maher

courtesy of Kacey Maher.

I never thought I would feel so content and at peace after 3 days of not showering and being packed in a van with 5 other people, but it was truly an amazing trip and one that I will never forget. Much love!

Oh yeah..Did I come here to go to school??

Well my wonderful break from school has ended, as classes started on Monday. And honestly, I was actually excited to go to class and compare AUT's education system to La Crosse's. I'm taking 4 classes, and I love my schedule of only having one class per day, and nothing on Fridays! The only rough part is that they're all 3 hours long, which makes me super antsy and I have a hard time focusing that long, but I really can't complain too much. It's similiar to home, in that the first year classes are usually lecture based and can have hundreds of studendts in a room, but since I'm taking mostly 3rd year "papers" as they call them, my classes have around 30 people in them.

On Monday, I had my Operations Management class from 2-5, and I was happy to find out I knew someone in the class already! At night, the girls and I went to the Midnight Youth concert at the University of Auckland’s (AU) campus bar, called Shadows. We have a bar on our campus too, which I thought was pretty crazy/cool, but it’s nothing compared to AU’s. The concert was great, and the guys actually remembered us from a couple weeks ago.

On Tuesday, I had a Maori Leadership class, which was recommended to the study abroad students, and is apparently a favorite among internationals because of the professor. So there were about 10 other AustraLearn people in my class, and it didn’t take me long to decide that I would love this class. We ended up taking a personality test in class, and out of the four personality types, I found out I was a “peaceful phlegmatic” which didn’t surprise me at all. Our professor, Jason King, looked at my answers and started asking me questions about my personality and what I would do in certain situations, and he was dead on for everything. Not much else happened on Tuesday considering I took a nap from 6-10pm which has definitely messed up my sleep system now.

Wednesday is my earliest class of the week…which starts at 11. Ha rough, I know. It was my International marketing paper, which will definitely keep me busy as our professor expects a lot from us. Afterwards, I came back and took a nap and woke up to really loud music in our courtyard because there was a carnival going on for orientation week. So I went downstairs and watched a mini magic show, where I was involuntarily chosen to put my finger in this little slicing contraption. No worries though, the magician was legit, and I still have all 10 digits. Afterwards, Mike and I went across the street for sushi and something else that I can’t remember the name of, but was delicious. I’m starting to really like sushi, which won’t be good when I get home and find it’s about 5 times more expensive than it is here. He also made me try miso soup, and told me I was a bad Asian for never having it before. Ha, but you all knew that already. Later, a bunch of us went to another concert at shadows and saw Katchafire. It’s a reggae band and they put on a fantastic show! We stayed there for awhile before heading to Margaritas to get our groove on!

Thursday, I didn’t have class until 2 which was great. I had intentions of getting up and going for a run outside until I realized there was practically a tropical storm proliferating (ok maybe a little exaggerated, but there was no way I was running in that). I walked down Queen Street for a little bit with Meghan before class, and bought some hemp to make a necklace with a shell/possibly a bone I found on the beach at Bay of Islands. Then I headed off to my Marketing Research class where I sat for 3 hrs wanting to run out and have a breakdown because I’m realizing that with every business class that I take, I’m enjoying it less and less. So as sad as it sounds, I might be changing my major when I get back, and will be in school an extra year or so…but hopefully I’ll find something that I can be passionate about and actually enjoy!

Fashion sidenote: After 4 days of class, and out of the 40,000 students at AUT, I have yet to see anyone sporting any AUT apparel which is just sad and unfortunate to me. As anyone who goes to LaX knows, sweats and UWL apparel is the outfit of choice for most. But here, the girls go to class in outfits that we would go downtown in (if not more dressy), girls don’t wear backpacks, and NO ONE is seen in sweats of any kind. Then again it is still pretty warm here, so I’ll have hope for the cooler months J

Anyways, we all were going to a study abroad party that the school was putting on for us, which of course was at a bar. They were giving out free drink vouchers and bringing out appetizers all night, which was awesome but kind of weird that they were encouraging us to drink so much…and a couple of our teachers and our study abroad advisor were there. I stayed for a little bit and met a couple new people, and then a few of us went to a comedy performance on campus which was hilarious!

Today, I had lots of errands to do…and so far I’ve been doing good things! However it started a little later than planned after I ran into Mandy downstairs and she wanted to go get sushi. (It was my 3^rd and her 5^th time this week having sushi) So her, Meredith, and I went across the street and ate and then went back to the apartment to watch an episode of the O.C. since Mandy has been watching Season 1 since we’ve been here. Afterwards, I caved and bought a phone, bought my textbooks, and then I came back to the apartment and finally called to get my internet working!! I don’t have any plans for the weekend, but if anything exciting happens, I’ll let you all know!! Much love and thanks for reading!!!