Wrapped up in Wellington

Waiting for Wellington

My morning started off very bad. Like I wrote a solid 4.5 pages on how bad my day was going, all before noon, but I'm not gonna type it out for ya because they're my problems not yours. Included in those pages tho are how my Uber driver left me like a mile from where I had to be in the pouring rain, my smoothie tasted like stuff I would not eat, and my flight got delayed. It was not off to a good start.
So then when we finally got in the air, it was only a 45 minute flight to Wellington. We fell out of the sky for a few hundred feet and I thought we were gonna die. But we made it.

My face with the pool being overrun
by children.

None of the ATMs would accept any of my cards. I tried all cards at all ATMs and none of them would give me money. So then I just used a card for a cab to the hotel and since the flight was all delayed, it was too late to really go do anything because it was almost dark and the hotel is like way uphill so no way am I gonna be walking up and down to town. There was no wifi either so I had to use my data so I tried to plan out what else to do besides my seal safari as quick as I could. Unfortunately it was a little too quick and I still had an hour before the restaurant would be open for dinner. So I just chilled. I thought of writing some of my way overdue blog posts but I just couldn't because my head hurt because I was having a rough week.
Then finally it was time for dinner so I go to the restaurant. I got the ribs because apparently pork is my new favorite food along with fried chicken (jk we all know I love all meats and fishes) but the ribs didn't make me feel any better so I had to take the rest back to my room because I was done being at the restaurant.
So then I went to the swimming pool but it was overrun by 7-12 year olds so I went in the sauna and hoped they would leave soon but they had big buckets of KFC and they had more of their friends join them every couple minutes and they lasted way longer than I lasted so I went back to my room and took a warm shower because the room was freezing and I don't think the heat was working but idk how to work their heating systems here because it seems no matter what I do they don't work.
Hopefully tomorrow will be better.

My face after eating my ribs,
barely any bbq sauce on it

Until next time,

xoxo,

Tasha

Ferry Cool Carvings, Man

Last day in Taupo. I finally did what Taupo is known for - the Maori Rock Carvings.
I woke up and checked out of my super cool hotel and walked past town to the marina wharf thing (what's the difference between a marina and a wharf? legit question, please reply in comments.) to the steamboat that would take me out to the carvings! Honestly I might be more excited about riding a steam boat than about seeing the carvings...oops.
I'm there like 30 minutes early. Like 30 minutes before we're supposed to be there which is 15 minutes before it leaves, so I'm like earlier than early but whatever. It's grey and raining, of course, but instead of going in the under cover cafe I just chill with the ducks because the rain never bothered me anyway.

It's cold outside so I sit inside on the steamboat. There's like six tables so I sit at one of them and there's lots of other tables with barely any people and these stupid people come and sit RIGHT NEXT TO ME. Not on the empty bench across from me or the empty bench next to that, but literally right next to me like the lady is leaning on my backpack that's in between me and her on the bench. It's very irritating. I get my cookie and tea and try my best to ignore it but it's seriously bothersome so when I finish my tea I move but by now the other inside benches are all taken because people realized it was cold outside. So I go outside and I am not happy about the stupid people taking over where I was. It is too early to be doing unpleasing things like sitting near me and leaning all over my stuff. Like back up lady. Ugh whatever.
So I go outside and the one worker lady is feeding the ducks so they're flying like right to the boat and then taking the bread and dropping to the water. It's cool. Oh and there's these SCREAMING two children that have been screaming since they got there and the lady let's them feed some and they stop screaming for a bit yay. Then the one gets like seasick or something and has to lay down and the other one starts coloring so no more screaming thankfully. But back to the ducks. Do they have Mallards in New Zealand? Because these ducks had green heads and the girl ducks were brown and like I live in Maryland and that's what a mallard looks like but I'm all the way in New Zealand and it just seems unlikely that they would have mallards here because it's so far away from Maryland. But idk man. Wait lemme google it. Woah they are mallards! A little piece of home so far from home. That's cray man. "which breeds throughout the temperate and subtropical Americas, Europe, Asia, and North Africa, and has been introduced to New Zealand, Australia, Peru, Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina, Chile, the Falkland Islands and South Africa" (Wiki). But uh, Wiki, Peru, Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina, and Chile are all part of the Americas so no need to repeat them...whatevs, I didn't edit it.
We go all around the lake which is bigger than Singapore. I didn't know a lake could be so big. Then there are lots of little mini bays (but they just call them Bays) coming off of the lake, but like I feel like that should be opposite, like shouldn't the Bay be bigger than the Lakes? I dunno. It's just our Chesapeake and even Assawoman are so big, these ones are so tiny I feel they don't deserve the title of Bay. I'm just gonna post a bunch of pictures at once so just chill, k thnx.
So then we get to the rock carvings and the captain explains like what all the carvings on the face mean but I took so long writing this post that I don't really remember but I do remember that it's from Tahiti even tho most people I've talked to think the Maori came from Malaysia. So that's interesting. Then next to the big face there are 28 other carvings, including a lizard and some others. The boat is quite small so we got to get really up close to the carvings and the captain turned the boat around 360 slowly so everyone got to get super close to everything, that was nice. My camera decided to die so much that I couldn't take any pictures when we got to the rock carvings so I had to use my phone but thankfully it let me take pictures.
Then we went back on the other side of the lake so we saw like pretty much everything from the lake.

 Then after the boat ride, I still had a long while until my bus back to Auckland, but it was cold and yucky. I wandered the town and the shops as long as I could. I got my mother a present but I had planned on getting stuff for everyone, so I didn't do as good as I wanted. I almost got my daddy a animal skull for the basement but it was like super expensive but the more I think about it the more I should've just got it because it wasn't really that expensive compared to like literally everything in New Zealand, but oh well. I did get myself a shoulder brace for my poor shoulder (but it stinks major so I don't actually wear it even tho my shoulder still kills me on the daily) and nail polish because in Auckland it's like more than $9 a little bottle and in Taupo it was only $2 a bottle. But now my nails are super chipped and I don't have any remover but oh well.
Oh also I went in the Oldest Record/Music store in New Zealand, but I couldn't decide on what to buy so after like probably a half hour of just staring at all the music trying to decide what to get I just left.
I got eggs and toast at a cafe then I walked over to the iSite because I knew there was a like flower area there and I was so done with the shops. There was a museum there! So I went into the museum because it was inside so it would probably be warm and I walked around there until it was pretty much time to go to the bus.
Museum pictures:

Garden of Well Being

lol these were on display for being the fishing rods
of like 100 years ago but literally the rods I use
at home look just like this ...

 I was like 15 minutes before I was supposed to be at the bus stop, but the bus was already there and they let us on. Literally as soon as I got in my seat/row (yeah I don't like sharing. I was a spoiled kid) it starts POURING. Like super hard. Great timing. I'm so glad he let us on early.
But the reason I got there so early was because I was gonna pee first. But once I saw it was gonna start raining I just got on the bus and I'm glad I did and I wasn't gonna get off to go pee in that downpour. So I just waited until we got to Hamilton to pee. I read some more of Sarah's book but mostly just listened to music and we finally got back to Auckland.
I ate half a big bag of goldfish on the bus but I was still kinda hungry and when we got back to Auckland it literally took everything in me not to stop by Father Ted's for a steak and Magners. But I had all my stuff with me, which was a lot, so that's why I didn't stop. If I didn't have my stuff with me I would've. I love that place, man. Miss Auckland when I get back? Ah, probably not. Miss Father Teds? Definitely.

Until next time,

xoxo,

Tasha

There Ain't No Cure for the Summertime Blues

"You went all the way to Australia for a concert?!" 

Well I went all the way to Japan for Disneyland and to London for a Ferris wheel...Don't underestimate me. 

Sunday morning rain is falling. Okay so I'm not sure if it was still raining when I woke up or not but that's how the song goes so let's all say that it was. I think it was. I awoke quite early in hopes of finding a church for Easter service. To my dismay, there were none. The Catholic church in Byron is only the smaller church of the larger Ballina church and no services were to be held that morning at the small church and I had no way of getting to Ballina. The only other church in town was closed indefinitely for renovations. So unfortunately I was forced to skip Easter this year. Apparently the Greeks don't celebrate Easter with the rest of the world though, so maybe I'll find out when their Easter is and pretend I'm Greek for the day, kinda like how I was Jewish at Christmas this year. (I suppose it just hasn't been a good holiday year for me; I hope God will understand.) I attempted to go back to sleep and when I couldn't sleep any longer I watched Gossip Girl for a couple hours until I just had to get out of the house.
Making my way downtown, walking fast, faces past and I'm blues bound.  The bus to the Bluesfest was downtown so I figured I might as well just start walking towards it and get to Blues a little earlier than I had wanted. The ride to the festival was actually fairly longer than I expected, and I'm certainly glad they had the shuttle running.
Staring blankly ahead just making my way, making my way through the crowd; I shuffled with the rest of the folks into the campgrounds for my first Byron Bay Bluesfest. On the flight from Sydney, I had been warned that the grounds often get quite muddy due to the Easter rains. Most people wear rain boots; I had left my brand-new-never-worn-bought-specifically-for-events-such-as-these rain boots in my room in Auckland. Before I left, I stared at them for a good five to fifteen minutes trying to decide which closed-toed shoes I wanted to take before opting to just take an extra pair of flip flops. But hey, my mother told me to get muddy. So that's exactly what I did. Not even 5 minutes into entering the area I was completely soaked in mud, like I could've won muddiest truck in my high school's homecoming car competitions with just myself, no truck needed.
I started off by walking around the vendors in search of something to eat. They also had many clothes vendors, so I figured if I found a change of clothes that wouldn't be the worst, considering it looked like God pooped on me (literally) for missing church on Easter. But the clothes were expensive and the food was unappetizing so I went and watched the cultural performance until I decided to settle for one of the many food options. I ended up choosing a crepe and it was so good; it was just like my momma's, but filled with pineapple and ham.
While I was eating some guy was playing guitar in the covered food area so as a tip I gave him my business card because my mother told me to give them out to everyone I meet (insert laughing emoji here). I also gave him 30 cents because I'm not totally heartless (or am I?) .
Then I strolled around between a couple of the tents. I saw the end of Houndmouth's set, which once it was over and I realized it was Houndmouth I remembered that I actually did wanna see them, but I didn't think they were playing on Sunday. Oh well. (You can check their picture at the beginning of this post, under the title.) I was front row, of course.
Then I found my way to two time Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Graham Nash's set. It was super crowded, which makes sense because he's super old. None of my pictures for him really came out because he's very pale with white hair but you can see my attempt to the left. I also saw the end of some other band's act, but I don't know who they were and to be honest I don't really care. I got some pictures of whoever it was, but since I don't know there's no point in posting it.
Once I was done wandering, I still had two hours until the first group I actually wanted to see - Modest Mouse. I decided I would just go to their stage anyways and take a seat. I got a seat in the second or third row and it started to rain again. It didn't last long though, and soon a band was taking the stage. Blackberry Smoke from Atlanta, GA came to try to entice me with their music. They were actually (sorry I've been using that word a lot this post, my b) exactly what I needed. Classic country rock from close to home (well, closer than New Zealand). It was actually (oops! sorry!) great and they can totally count me as a fan now. They were the first full set I stayed to see, and I didn't even plan on watching them at all.
I stayed in my seat for the majority of their part because I could totally see everything and why stand when you can sit? But for the last song I took my rightful spot in the front row and grabbed a closer pic for ya'll. The picture above is from my seat, the one to the left is from the front.
Because the seats were so great I was going to just go back to my seat for the Modest Mouse concert and do the same thing - a majority in my seat and the ending standing up close. But the Blackberry Smoke set ended over a half hour before Modest Mouse was set to go on and as soon as they ended the area started filling up, so I went and grabbed my spot while I still could. Apparently a lot of people like Modest Mouse. I only know them because of my dearest Pandora, but they were totally not what I was expecting.

The girl played like three instruments and was so full of energy. They were all wearing black except for the lead singer. He was in beachy pinks and blues and stuff. I expected them all to be dressed like that, and not so many of them. They had a full band with like orchestra-like instruments. Anyways, lead singer dude was either seriously on something, seriously loving what he was doing, on seriously insane, or a mixture of all of the above. He legit looked crazy and was bouncing around like he had too much sugar and was 8 years old. But I guess it was entertaining?
(Lol see this is what I do; I judge so hard on the band when I don't know their songs. Poor fellas.)
After Modest Mouse it was time to meander on down to the Jambalya for the Wailers! Although Bob Marley is dead, I was still super excited! I had a while until they were scheduled to start also, but I was hoping to grab a seat like they had in the Mojo tent. I guess they were expecting a smaller audience because this tent was much smaller and didn't have any chairs, so back to standing it was. It was fine though because I secured a spot in the center middle of the front and, like for Modest Mouse, the area quickly filled.
The Wailers were great! I knew every song. They had 5 sets during the entirety of Bluesfest, so for each they did a different Bob Marley album and I was fortunate enough to land on the night of Legend. The bassist was an original Wailer, and the drummer and other guitar player looked like they could've been as well, but they really prided themselves on the bassist who needed to be seated while playing.
The lead male was a great singer and had the perfect energy and vibes, and the female singer was totally gorgeous. They definitely did justice to the music and I really enjoyed their concert.
The Aussies, however, need to learn how to handle that type of music. They were literally going insane. Like I go to Dew Tour every year (well, when OC was fortunate enough to host it) and I've never seen such crazed concert-goers. They were making out and lighting up and throwing themselves around and yeah that sounds like pretty much any concert but let me tell you, it was bad. Like I don't know how to describe it but they shouldn't be allowed to listen to true reggae if it makes them act like that. Also (this wasn't one of the crazy parts, believe it or not) I saw this old guy smoking a j with what appeared to be his granddaughters and they were like trying to be obvious they were trying to hide it and then later the girl was grinding on the old guy so I really hope it wasn't her grandfather. Maybe it was her suga daddy. Either way, EW. (Maybe ew used to stand for either way and people just always made a face at it and that's how we got ew...interesting. Because I totally just meant like an emphasized ew at the end of that either way lol)
And this guy that I can't put with the rest of the Aussies because he didn't seem like an Aussie because I couldn't understand a word he said proposed to me. Four times. So like I was just minding my own business, singing the songs, and this guy bumps into me then tells this girl next to me he loves her then like half a song later he bumps into me again and asks me something and I can't understand him so I had him repeat himself and I still couldn't understand him so he had to repeat himself like four times and when I finally understood him he was like "Will you marry me I love you you're so beautiful" and I'm just like lol "no go ask that girl" and I pointed to the girl I can only assume he asked before me. It was kinda funny but kinda disturbing lol.
So then I survived the rest of the concert and the first two encores then I left to go stand in line for their signing which was to take place after the concert. Here I ran into some new friends! I was very much very covered in mud at this point and people were starting to notice. So I get in line for the Wailers signing and the guy in front of me is like "is this your first time here?" and I'm like "yeah" and he's like "yeah I can tell, we both picked the wrong shoes" lol and his friend was all like "the mud looks good on you" and I was just like "thanks" and now we're friends and I'm gonna hang with them at 2am while I'm on my layover in Brisbane for 7 hours on my way to Bali in a couple weeks.
So I didn't actually have anything for the Wailers to sign, I was just hoping for a pic but they convinced me to go get something for them to sign so they saved my spot in line while I went and bought a generic Bluesfest 2016 CD (the actual irony: the Wailers aren't even on the CD even though they had the most sets all weekend). When I got back in line I even got to get in front of them! What great new friends. They also received my business card.
Turns out it's a good thing I got that CD for them to sign because no pictures were allowed (I'm not very good at following rules, clearly I took a picture) and I wouldn't have been allowed up without something for them to sign. So one point for the Aussies.
After the signing we went to the UB40 concert together as well. They didn't stay the whole time because they had to meet their mate to go back to their accommodations. To be honest, I didn't last much longer than they did.
"Who did you come here to see?" "UB40" ....Who didn't you stay to see? UB40. :/
They didn't start until so late, and it was such a long day and I was so tired. I stayed as long as I could before I went for a burger before I left. I didn't get to hear Red Red Wine or (I Can't Help) Falling in Love with You, but I did get to see The Way You Do The Things You Do. I kinda wish I stayed longer, but I'm also glad I left when I did because otherwise I wouldn't have made it back. After the bus back I still had to walk from town back to the house, and as tired as I was it probably took close to a half an hour.
Once I made it back to the house, I spent a good 45 minutes in the shower trying to scrub all the mud off me. I STILL have mud stuck in my toenails and it's been over a week. But I did the best I could with cleaning myself and I tried to make sure the tub wasn't left totally black (eh, not much luck) and exhausted, I headed to bed.
You can check out some highlights on my Bluesfest & Kayak video, on my Facebook now!

Until next time,

xoxo,

Tasha

Quaint Queenstown

Okay, so before I came to Queenstown, we went to the Bay of Islands and spent some days in Auckland, but I'm currently sitting in our house in Queenstown so I feel like writing about Queenstown now and I'll fill you in on previous experiences in another post. It will be out of order, but this is my blog, not yours, so deal with it.
Now to tell my tale from the beginning of this journey...
A couple of days ago, our Loyola group had a meeting with the Office of International Students or something to collect our Auckland Uni IDs (post to follower later - warning: will contain another rant). At the meeting, Luke, our program coordinator advisor thing, said we could hop on a plane tomorrow if we wanted, so that's exactly what we did. I was walking back to the apartment dorm things with Neelam and Celeste when Neelam mentioned wanting to leave for Queenstown tomorrow. That sounded good to me; why be in Auckland when it's a five day break and you could be off exploring the country? So we gathered some friends, sat down and booked our trip to Queenstown that would leave the following morning at 5am.
To celebrate our spontenuity, we drank Scrumpy's and played water pong until we realized we should be asleep. Sure enough, the 4:45 wake-up call came too soon, leave me extremely tired and in need of coconut water. Thankfully, the flight was short and very entertaining. Trivia played on the hanging television screens and I spent the hour and fifty minutes proving my musical and geographic knowledge with questions like "What Van Halen song is named after its year?" (1984), "What band was made up of Nikki Sixx, Tommy Lee, ..., ..." (Motley Crue), and "What ocean contains the Ring of Fire, known for its volcanic activities?" (Pacific). I also learned more trivia about lesser known (to me) subjects, such as "Who was Brad Pitt's girl from 2000-2005?" (Jennifer Aniston). Okay, so I did know that answer too but it's 2am and I can't remember what I didn't know. Point is, it was great. I love trivia. It would probably be in my top 10 favorite things. Anyways, the plane landed and as we descended the steps to exit the plane, the view was breathtaking.

Also, I forgot to mention that security here is very lax. Like my carry on was 3.3 kilos overweight and contained a full bottle of sunscreen (and one of bug spray) and they didn't take anything or weigh me. I can't even remember if we were x-rayed. They didn't check our IDs. Like it's a good thing New Zealand is so safe or that would actually be pretty scary.

But year so after the plane and a breakfast in town we headed to our house. We rented a whole house, no big deal. Being so last minute, all the hostels were full and a house was cheaper than a hotel. And holy smokes it's amazing. We should rent houses all the time. It's three levels. The first floor contains a guest area/bedroom and bathroom. The second houses the living room, dining room, outdoor eating/living area, and garden/grass. Upstairs is the other bathroom and our rooms. Us girls, Neelam, Sarah, Emily, and I get a room with 4 bunk beds and while Justin, being the man of the house, gets the room with the view and queen bed that's right next to the bathroom.

View from the our house.

On our first day in this mountainous town, we sat down and planned out our activities for the week. Let me just take a second to talk about this group of people that I'm here with, because we've been able to divide ourselves at times and come together for other times so that we are all able to do what we want to do. I think that's a rare thing. 

 So first off, there's obviously me. If you don't know me, thanks for stopping by to check out my life for a bit. I'm an 18 year old junior at Loyola University Maryland, studying abroad at the University of Auckland for the semester. I'm a blonde cheerleader, International Business major, and I love the water, traveling, and dogs. I'm here with two others from Loyola, Neelam and Sarah, and two that I met a few days ago. I'm the youngest in our group; Neelam is the oldest. She's 24. She went to culinary school before coming to Loyola and she's also a big traveler. She;s vegetarian and likes to meditate. Sarah is the other Loyola student in our group. She's a Statistics major and although we practically just met, I can tell we're gonna be good friends. Emily goes to UCONN and she's super chill. She wasn't part of our original group but I'm so glad she came! Justin is the man of the group. He goes to Chapman University (shoutout to the Delta Gammas!). He's into film and is a great photographer. He's been on two cruises - Mediterranean and Alaska. They were Carnival and Princess, respectively. Anyway, he's cool. Naturey and such. So obviously we're all different with out own interests, yet somehow we mesh perfectly and fit together like the puzzle of friendship we didn't know we had. It's great. I've been with them for only four days and I've never felt more... like belonging I guess? Idk but it's nice. They're great for the soul, but hard for the face. I've never smiled so much; my face hurts. (Also I stole the pic of all of us from Emily)
So anyways, we all have different comfort levels and wanna do different things and it actually worked out perfectly. There was never a time when one of us was by him/herself, but we did split up into groups often. I won't tell you all of our activities now, but don't worry; I will as I get to the day.
I know I get quite rant-y but if you recall I mentioned after we had breakfast in town the first day we came back and planned/booked our activities for the week. We then walked into town to explore this new city. We found the beach, but it was too terribly cold to possibly make use of it. Earlier we had decided to eat out our first night and buy groceries for the rest of our time in Queenstown. So after exploring for a couple hours, we went to a Mexican restaurant. This is where that rant about Fat Fish is going to come into play again; if you can't recall what Fat Fish is, please revisit my Auckland Arrival post.

My Queenstown burrito

Half of my Fat Fish burrito
(I ate the first half before I could get a decent pic - it's soo good!)

Okay, so I'm not too fond of Mexican food; it tends to be a bit spicy for me. (Note: this does not mean I don't like other Latino foods. I definitely do; they use different spicinesses.) So, I was a little reluctant to join everyone, but I was starving and wanted to stay with the group. Luckily, we were just in time for the lunch specials (even though it was 5pm), so everything was cheaper. I was also pleased to see they had pulled pork burritos. At Fat Fish, one of my favorites is the Stinky Beach Burrito - pulled pork and steak asada. Of course I ordered the pulled pork burrito, expecting it to be not nearly as good as my beloved Fat Fish, but decent. Haha, nope. Boy was I wrong. It was like totally awful. Like my mouth was literally on fire. I couldn't even finish half of it. I left hungrier than I cam in. Luckily, there was a KFC on the way to the grocery store that did the trick. It was lovely! I knew I'd miss fried chicken but I didn't realize how much until I had some. After my wonderful chicken, we went to the grocery store and returned home where we gathered 'round and played cards.





The next day, Thursday, we planned on rain the whole day. The weather did not disappoint. Neelam, Justin, and Emily went back into town for more exploring and shopping. Sarah and I went tot he Kiwi Bird Conservatory where we learned all about the native animals of New Zealand. Fun Fact: only 3 mammals are native to New Zealand. We also saw a real dinosaur - the Tuatara. It looks like an iguana, kinda, (I don't think so but others do) but it isn't even a lizard. It is a reptile, but not a lizard. It's relatively small, but it survived the death of the larger dinosaurs by going into hibernation underground where it only breathed once every hour. Then of course we saw the Kiwi Bird itself, but weren't allowed ot photograph it due to the lighting situation - night and day are reversed because kiwis are nocturnal. During the day, the room is dark except for a red light that allows us visitors to see the bird. Then at night, the big lights come on so the kiwis think it's daytime and go to sleep. To be honest, if the guide wasn't in there with us, I would've sneaked a picture (without flash, of course). All in all, I'm really glad I went tot he place; it was really informative and mucho divertido for a rainy day.
After that, Emily, Justin, and I played in the rain! :)

Also, side note to my readers: this post has literally taken me so long to write, even though it's just my thoughts/recap of my activities. I've just been so busy (you know me; can't stay in one place too long) that I keep having to put this down and come back to it. This is my third time adding more to this particular post, and I don't think I'll be able to finish this time either. I'm currently on the plane back to Auckland, jammin' to some Jon Bon. But like we're gonna be landing soon and I've only gotten through the second day. So if I seem repetitive, choppy, a bit mixed, it's because this singular post has been added onto several times. The others shouldn't be like this, hopefully. And I also learned to not do whole trips in one post (except Bay of Islands because that was quick) because they're just way too long. So I'm sorry this one is so long, but it should be the only one that's nearly as long, so get over it. k thnx.
On the third day, we created the oceans (or should I say lake, considering our location and such?). Nah, I'm just kidding. We're not God, we're just American. But seriously, on the third day, we split again. Let me pause here to add each time we split, and even when we don't split, we come back together for cards and Netflix before bed. So anyways, on Friday Justin, Neelam, and Sarah went hiking (tramping) while Emily and I took a bus tour. I am SO glad we did the tour instead. I'm not a hiker. Me and mountains don't get along. Tours are good. I like tours.
We did our bus tour through the BBQ bus, but we only did the Queenstown half fay instead of the full Milford Sound expedition. There were only four of us - Emily, me, and two Korean girls. We did a lot, but we didn't get to do afternoon tea. I think it's because we ran out of time, but it's disappointing because I was really looking forward to it. I'll email them and see what they say. But we went to several "viewing points" which were probably just as nice as the hike. These spots include Hayes (Bay, maybe?), Coronet Peak, and other destinations. We also went to the indoor go-kart park, the to the world's first bungy. I was freaking out just watching them! After that, but in between view points, we went to Gibbson's Winery and Cheesery.
(Okay so it's now 11:19pm Sunday and I've decided I can reward myself with sleep if I finish this post!! It's taking way too long!)
So here in New Zealand, as in most of the world, I am old enough to consume alcoholic beverages. So old apparently that they only ID you if you're buying from the grocery store. Anyways, so I could participate in the wine tastings at the wine caves. I don't like wine, but hey it's included so might as well. I also don't like cheese very much, but they were surprisingly good, especially the pepper cheese, which is very weird because I don't like pepper either. Okay, back to the wine. So Gibbson's is the oldest winery in New Zealand (or at least the South Island) and they have over 400 barrels fermenting the wine at all times. They experiment with several wines but are most known for their Pinots. During the tastings, I learned what each wine goes best with: Riesling (the only one I actually liked) is good for white fish. Pinot Griso is good for white meat, and Pinot Nior is good for red meat. Maybe if they gave us meat I would've liked the wines more; I love meat. But it was cool to see and taste. Although I really dislike the taste of wine and cheese, I like the idea of it; it makes me seem less peasant-ish when at wine and cheese functions.

Emily playing in the stream in Arrowtown

We also checked out Arrowtown. Historically, this is where the Chinese found gold. There's a gold shop and you can even pan for gold. I didn't do this because why spend money panning for gold in New Zealand when you can just pan for pirate at Frontier Town? I wonder if they put pirate in the river in Arrowtown as well... Although we didn't pan for gold, we did visit the gold shop to see the big chunks found in the past. But, we spent the most of our time in Arrowtown playing in the stream and collecting pictures. But hey, it was fun.
After our tour, we were supposed to all meet for ice skating, but everyone was too tired to make the hike back into town to skate. Besides, Saturday was our biggest day and we needed to prepare. You might think this means sleep, but in reality it means more card games and BMS (Blue Mountain State?).

Made it to the top!

Okay. So Saturday. Our big day. Our last full day in Queenstown. The only day it was guaranteed to be sunny. Saturday is the day of jumping, zipping, and, well, more mountains.
Emily and Neelam started the day before the rest of us with other activities. Emily survived the Jet Boat and Neelam went on a bike tour. Justin, Sarah, and I walked into town and took the Skyview Gondola up to the Bob's Peak. I took a super similar cable car in Australia through the rain forest, and I was scared almost to death but not quite. This time, as soon as I saw the cable cars I knew I had to do it again, so I had been waiting for this since we arrived on Wednesday. Not sure if it was the great company, the years gained, or what, but this time I was only slightly (very slightly) scared, and that was really only when it jolted at the top. Go me.
Once we reached the top of the mountain, Emily, Justin, and Sarah went bungy jumping. Emily just jumped right off; Justin did a front flip; Sarah took a little encouragement but faced her fears and didn't die. I was the (not so good) photographer.

Emily

Justin

Sarah

After they were done threatening their lives, Justin, Sarah and I went to meet Neelam on the other side of the top of the mountain for our Zip Line session. Emily stayed over at the bungy because she had a 1:30 appointment with the swing. According to her, it was pure terror. I probably would've had a heart attack and died, but kudos to her.
I'm pretty much the biggest baby ever, and I was even a bit nervous for ziplining. Okay, like a lot. Like I had to call my mother for her to tell me to do it before I could even book it because I wasn't having it. But I'm actually so glad I listened to her. As soon as I saw the harnesses, even just laying on the platform, I was instantly calmed. It felt like I was right at home in good ol' OC, getting ready for the ropes course, and not getting ready to zip down a huge mountain. It was a lot different than Frontier Town though because it wasn't a full ropes course, it was literally just zip line after zip line. As I was zipping, I realized I had been zipping literally my entire life at Sailwinds Park in Cambridge and that it was super easy. Also the guides did all the hooking up stuff so we never even messed with our own carabiners or anything. It didn't even seem like we were going down an entire mountain, yet somehow we ended at the bottom! The views were pretty nice, too.
My daddy wants to see some of the videos I took on my GoPro, so I'll add one to the bottom of this post. They had us do challenges like going upside down, singing a song, and trust falling. It was fun.
You can't go to Queenstown and not have a Fergberger. So after ziplining, that's what we did. We only had to wait like 10 minutes which apparently is insanely short. I got the Tropical Swine burger, but you probably could've guessed that. It was really good, but I think Houston's burger was quite nice as well.
After such an eventful day, we headed back to the house to relax for a couple hours before beginning our night.

Ice Cup at the Ice Bar :P

One of the things I was looking most forward to in all of New Zealand was the Ice Bar. That Ice Bar is located in Queenstown. Emily found out about a special deal going on for free entry into the Ice Bar with the purchase of soda from a local convenience store, so we went to the Minus 5* Ice Bar while the others recooped from their adventurous day.
It was awesome! It was actually a lot smaller than I would've thought, but it was so cool! It's really -8.3*C , not -5*, but it really didn't feel very cold. Maybe that's just because I'm from Maryland where it gets colder than that at times during the winter. Either way, it was spectacular. I really wish we could've stayed longer so I could've eaten my ice cup. I attempted to, but it was too hard for my little teeth to bit it without hurting myself. We could only stay a few minutes because we then had to go meet the others for the Big Night Out Pub Crawl.

All smiles after the big win!

At first, I didn't really enjoy the pub crawl because it seemed no one wanted to dance with or talk to me. But then they fed us pizza and my night started to get better. We didn't stay the full time because our flight was the next day, but the last bar we went to was the greatest because Justin and I were selected to play in the contest game for that bar and WE WON!! It was a toilet paper roll game where Justin had to wrap me up like a mummy in toilet paper. As the competition got fiercer, I had to spin one way while Justin went around me the other way in order to cover me the fastest. But it worked! I thought the prize would be just a picture for their Facebook or something, but Jack (one of the guys in charge) let me select an envelope (I couldn't read what either of them said) and I selected a FREE Kayaking with Dolphins in Byron Bay!!! I had been planning on going to Byron Bay for Easter break, but was on the fence since I found out the two bands I wanted to see the most at the Bluesfest (the reason I wanted to go) were playing at practically the same time, just on different stages. But that was the confirmation I needed and now I'm so excited to go! I've emailed the company and they've acknowledged my winnings. It was a great way to end our Queenstown holiday!!
Now I'm back in Auckland and ready for bed. Be on the lookout for lots of catch-up posts this week!
Until next time.
xoxo,
Tasha

PS this is so not the best video, but Blogger is being picky as to what I can and cannot upload :(