This week was heaps of fun! Monday I went to a bar called Margarita's. They have dollar beer night, so a lot of people go. I tried Tui, but it was really gross. I don't understand how anyone drinks that stuff. Tuesday I spent the whole day studying for my "midterm" on Wednesday. My Maori and Pacific Health Care class is team taught. Right now we are doing the Pacific Health half and we had our midterm on that. Later in the semester, I am assuming I will have another midterm on the Maori health. The exam was pretty simple, all short answer. I was done really quickly. Wednesday night we went out for sushi for Sarah's birthday (a girl from my program). Leigh and I split two types, chicken teryaki rolls and salmon avacado. It was soooo good! Michael and I split an order of egg rolls, but they were not like any egg rolls I have ever seen. They were litterally eggs cooked in a roll, a little like an omlet and sort of sweet. Thursday I made kumara mash (sweet potatoe mash) with onions and chicken cooked in honey mustard. I was really proud because it was really good. It is probably one of my favorite meals and will be repeated many times.
Friday we left for Waitomo! Leigh, Victoria, Riley (a guy from Florida), Kevin (a guy from New Hampshire), and I went together. We stayed in a hostel in Turangi near Mt. Ruapehu because Victoria and Riley went skiing. We stopped on the drive for dinner at a take away place. I had a burger and kumara chips. They put mayonaise, carrots, and lettice on it again with my tomato sauce and cheese. There was also sour cream for my kumara chips. I decided mixing a little sour cream and tomato sauce is the perfect thing to dip the kumara chips in. But, you don't want too much because kumara tastes so good. We also stopped to stretch our legs at one point. Most kiwi towns have a public restroom, so we stopped at the one in a little town. While the guys were in the restroom the girls decided to go see if an ice cream place was open. It was, but it was a little farther from the car than we expected. We got two scoops for $1.60! Hokey Pokey ice cream the New Zealand favorite!!! It brings back taste memories from third grade I swear! By the time we got back to the car and told the guys to go get some the lady closed shop! We felt so bad, but they seemed ok with it. Riley and I switched seats for the rest of our ride. To explain the car, it is a tiny toyota. Three people in the back seat, Leigh is about my size and Riley is taller and has broader sholders but a normal six foot guy. We overlapped on shoulders in the back with the outside shoulders touching the windows. A little cramped, we were nice and cozy. The 4 hour car ride was great though. We sang, joked, and just talked. The hostel was pretty cool too. We had a "dorm room" with four bunk beds. There is a community kitchen, dining room, and lounge. There is also a climbing wall and cafe associated with the hostel, but not attached.
Saturday, we d
rove Victoria and Riley to bus stop at the bottom of the mountain. They had to buy tickets up to the mountain and then back to Turangi because we had to take the car. Then Kevin drove us to Waitomo to meet a group of our friends at the caves. We stopped on the way in Te Kuiti for lunch, mmm.... meat pies! Then we went caving at 3:00. We had 12 peopl (10 from our group) and 3 guides. They bused us to a place to change into wet suites, gum boots, and hellmates. Then taught us how to absale down and attach ropes to our belt things. (obviously I picked up the terminology) We practiced on a hill then headed to the cave. I was really cold for the first little bit because it was windy and raining out. One of our guides was Fish, he was really surprised when we knew what The Warehouse (their Wall-Mart) was because he thought we were normal tourists, not students. Then got mad at me because I said Maori wronge (he is Maori) and turns out he is only 19!!! yikes!!! Gavin was another one of our guides. He taught a few of us in the back to say Tomaki! when something is really cool. he goes "say Tomaki!!! Brother!!! or Tomaki!!! Cousin!!!" so I always said Tom
aki Cousin!!! All of us that heard it were screaming it the whole time. Once we were in the cave we split into a group of 4 with the third guide and a group of 8 with Fish and Gavin. They said that because of the rain the water was 80% higher than normal and about two cm from the cut off point. In other words the demo pics show little ripples of water and it is up to people's chests when they are crawling and our pictures show the water up to our chins when we are crawling. We also had some intense waterfalls that we had to absale down on the ropes. Fish would be at the top of the waterfall attaching us in and Gavin was at the bottom getting the group ready for the next thing. Fish told us to yell once we were half way down. A few times he didn't like how loud the person was and would do different things to them. He sat blocking the water for Max (from the Arcadia group) until he was at the bottom then stood up and he got pounded. He dumped his boot of water on Erin (I can't remember where she is from) and rushed some extra water on Leigh by lifting his foot. Both of them would basically jump down the absale points by running down the walls and stuff. There was one point where we had to absale down into what seemed to be a dead end because there was so much water. Except really there was a tiny whole we had to go into but it was blocked by the waterfall. So you get smashed by the water while you are climbing head first into who knows where. Then you had to turn around in the little tunnel and slide down the tiny waterfalls until you came to a tunnel you had to crawl through. Fish was in the tunnel by the waterfalls to help us through, but it wasn't too reassuring. There was another point when the entire group had to go down the rope into a tiny pool and we all had to fit. I was the third person in and it was up to my waist. This was the only time I was really cold. We also got to go into some caverns with glow worms! At one point we turned out our lights and looked at them all. Fish called them "carnivorous, shit-burning, horney maggots" and that is a quote. They use chemiluminescence to get rid of their waste!!! haha go figure, Advanced Liquid Logic should refer to glow worms instead of fire flies next time, maybe it will sound cooler or just confuse people. While in the cave, we would scream Ayyyyy-ohhhhhhh!!!!!! or "Hey you guys!!!" Fish would get caught up in it then realize this is what the tourists were doing and try to switch it into a song. haha!
rove Victoria and Riley to bus stop at the bottom of the mountain. They had to buy tickets up to the mountain and then back to Turangi because we had to take the car. Then Kevin drove us to Waitomo to meet a group of our friends at the caves. We stopped on the way in Te Kuiti for lunch, mmm.... meat pies! Then we went caving at 3:00. We had 12 peopl (10 from our group) and 3 guides. They bused us to a place to change into wet suites, gum boots, and hellmates. Then taught us how to absale down and attach ropes to our belt things. (obviously I picked up the terminology) We practiced on a hill then headed to the cave. I was really cold for the first little bit because it was windy and raining out. One of our guides was Fish, he was really surprised when we knew what The Warehouse (their Wall-Mart) was because he thought we were normal tourists, not students. Then got mad at me because I said Maori wronge (he is Maori) and turns out he is only 19!!! yikes!!! Gavin was another one of our guides. He taught a few of us in the back to say Tomaki! when something is really cool. he goes "say Tomaki!!! Brother!!! or Tomaki!!! Cousin!!!" so I always said Tom
aki Cousin!!! All of us that heard it were screaming it the whole time. Once we were in the cave we split into a group of 4 with the third guide and a group of 8 with Fish and Gavin. They said that because of the rain the water was 80% higher than normal and about two cm from the cut off point. In other words the demo pics show little ripples of water and it is up to people's chests when they are crawling and our pictures show the water up to our chins when we are crawling. We also had some intense waterfalls that we had to absale down on the ropes. Fish would be at the top of the waterfall attaching us in and Gavin was at the bottom getting the group ready for the next thing. Fish told us to yell once we were half way down. A few times he didn't like how loud the person was and would do different things to them. He sat blocking the water for Max (from the Arcadia group) until he was at the bottom then stood up and he got pounded. He dumped his boot of water on Erin (I can't remember where she is from) and rushed some extra water on Leigh by lifting his foot. Both of them would basically jump down the absale points by running down the walls and stuff. There was one point where we had to absale down into what seemed to be a dead end because there was so much water. Except really there was a tiny whole we had to go into but it was blocked by the waterfall. So you get smashed by the water while you are climbing head first into who knows where. Then you had to turn around in the little tunnel and slide down the tiny waterfalls until you came to a tunnel you had to crawl through. Fish was in the tunnel by the waterfalls to help us through, but it wasn't too reassuring. There was another point when the entire group had to go down the rope into a tiny pool and we all had to fit. I was the third person in and it was up to my waist. This was the only time I was really cold. We also got to go into some caverns with glow worms! At one point we turned out our lights and looked at them all. Fish called them "carnivorous, shit-burning, horney maggots" and that is a quote. They use chemiluminescence to get rid of their waste!!! haha go figure, Advanced Liquid Logic should refer to glow worms instead of fire flies next time, maybe it will sound cooler or just confuse people. While in the cave, we would scream Ayyyyy-ohhhhhhh!!!!!! or "Hey you guys!!!" Fish would get caught up in it then realize this is what the tourists were doing and try to switch it into a song. haha! When we got back out of the cave it was dark. The hardest part was walking up the hill out of the sheep pasture. We got back into the building with our clothes and showers. I slipped two small rocks down my wet suite to take home when I was in the cave. So, when I took off my jacket they fell on the floor. All three guides saw it and Fish was like "ohhh... theif! theif!" I turned red then he said "they're just rocks you can take them" so I grabbed them up and went to shower. Everyone who saw it said my face was priceless. haha! oh well, I'll never see them again! and I've got my rocks. We got back to the main building at 7:30 and bought the picture CD. Then headed back (2 hours) to Turangi. Everything closes at 7-8ish so we stopped at another cafe/take away place. I had the Hawaiian Burger, which includes the usual kiwi toppings plus pinapple and beats! It was pretty good. Then Leigh and I split some more hokey pokey ice cream and a fried Moro Bar (like a Milky Way, but Cadbary). I had to drive back (wooo hooo! left side) because Kevin was too tired.
Victoria and Riley had a fun time coming back on the bus and had no problem getting into the hostel. They dried their clothes, made dinner and fell asleep. Kevin is the only one with a cell phone, so when they woke up at 11PM they didn't know where we were and freaked out. We had no way of finding out which room they were in and they had no way to find out where we were in general. So they walked to the hostel we were at the night before (we had to switch because there was no room) and got there right when Alex and the other group drove in (they were saying at that hostel). Alex had a phone so they called us and he drove them back. Everyone had a great day!
Sunday we decided to head back slowly. It was nicer weather than Saturday, but still scattered showers. We stopped at Lake Rotopounamu and took a couple pictures, but it was raining so we didn't walk around it. It was the day of rainbows! So while we were chasing them all back to Auckland, we stopped at Waitomo again and did a short walk there. It was the beginning of the Waitomo walkway, which goes through a cow pasture. This is the only point where our whole group did not seem too thrilled with what we were doing. Two people didn't want to ruin their shoes and two were completely happy, I was stuck in the middle because I new I had been playing tour guide and picked the walk, so I felt bad. It was fun though. We cut back on the road though and tried to wash off our shoes some in the public toilets (bathrooms). The rest of the ride back was still lots of fun. A little quiet because everyone was tired but still fun. All in all, a wonderful weekend!
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