Thanks for the adventures New Zealand, it's been real

      I’ve spent the morning packing, and it’s hard to believe that in less just a few hours I’ll be on my way to the airport to head home. These past four months have gone by so quickly, sometimes too quickly. It’s going to be hard to say goodbye to New Zealand. Being so far from home, who knows if I’ll ever make it back here. I’ve met some great friends, seen amazing places, and grown used to a traveler’s lifestyle that I know will not be available to me in the U.S. 

Although it will be sad to leave, I’m ready to head home. I’m excited for the warm weather, not having to share an apartment or cook all my food, and...oh yea, my family (i miss you all dearly :) ) I’ve enjoyed my time here in New Zealand and I’m grateful for everything I was able to do, but I am definitely ready to head back home. 

Daniel and I leave leave Christchurch this evening, where we will then fly to Auckland. We then have a lovely 13 hour flight over to LAX, and then a red-eye to Chicago and a quick jump over to Indy. Only 25 hours of transit and we’ll be home in no time! 

Thank you for letting me share my adventures with you all. See you soon. 

Erin 

Study Week....what's that?

       Last week Daniel and I traveled to the North Island during our “study week”. After one of the bumpiest flights of my life, we finally landed in Auckland safe and sound. We had an entire day to venture around Auckland before catching an early bus the next morning. Because we had already spent a significant amount of time there during our Fall Break, we decided to take a ferry to Rangatoto Island, which is a volcanic island off the coast of Auckland. We spent the afternoon hiking up to the top of the volcano, and then walking on the coast of the island. It was great to finally have some warm, sunny weather again. 

The View of Auckland from the Ferry

Rangatoto Island

The next day we caught an early bus to Waitomo Glowworm Caves. There, we had booked a caving adventure with the Blackwater Rafting Company. After being issued a wetsuit, booties, and all of the proper climbing equipment, our group of 6 (I was the only girl) jumped in the vans and headed towards the cave. In order to enter the cave, we had to repel 110 feet. From there, we walked around the cave with our guide, who educated us on the history of the cave. Then, our guide told us that we had to zip line down the cave in the complete dark. Because it was dark, we had to scream the entire way down to let the other guide know when to stop us. I had no idea we were going to be zip-lining, and I thought this was a really unique and awesome feature of the tour. After having a quick snack, we jumped from a platform into absolutely freezing cold water to begin our venture to the far side of the cave where the glow worms live. When we reached the end of the cave, our guide had us turn all of our headlamps off and slowly paddle back so we could lay back in our tubes and enjoy the sight of the glow worms above us. We then ditched the tubes and continued through the rest of the cave on foot. To exit the cave, we climbed up two waterfalls without being clipped in to anything! It was a wild adventure! 

We used mud to paint each others faces 

getting ready to go caving! 

Our next stop on our trip was HOBBITON. I was really worried about scheduling this part of our trip, as it was suppose to rain the day of our tour. Thankfully, the weather cleared as we were driving to Matamata from Rotorua, and we had sunny skies. This was probably my favorite part of the trip, mostly because I’ve wanted to visit hobbiton since LOTR came out in theatres. I felt like a 3-year old on Christmas waiting to open presents as we rode the bus to the set. Seeing the set was amazing, completely undescribable. There are 44 hobbit hosues that have been permanently set up on the farm after the production of “The Hobbit”. Our guide talked about specific places on the set that you can see in the film and other nerdy references which of course makes me want to watch LOTR all over again.  

Bag End

hobbit hole 

sam's house 

Once again, the weather held out for us as our journey continued down the North Island and we were able to hike the Tongariro Crossing. This hike is known as the best day hike in New Zealand. It is a 6-8 hour hike that crosses between two active volcanoes. The crossing is the coolest hike I have ever done. The views of the volcanoes were amazing and it was such a unique hike that is difficult to find other places.  

mt ngauruhoe

We returned to Christchurch late on Sunday evening, and I have spent the majority of the week studying for my upcoming finals. On Monday, the Dalai Lama visited the University of Canterbury. In typical UCSA style, instead of giving His Holiness a pristine place to speak, UCSA set him up to speak at the college bar. He’s actually a very funny person with an amazing laugh. 

Hope everyone is enjoying the warm weather, I am extremely jealous as I am now sitting in the library in my winter puffy! 

Erin 

So...It's been awhile

Hi all! 

Sorry it’s been so long since I last updated. Nothing too exciting has happened since then, as I haven’t traveled much since Dunedin. All the traveling finally started to wear on me after I returned from Dunedin. To be perfectly honest, I was getting tired of all the planning, the bus rides, and living out of a backpack. It really hit me when I got sick the week after Dunedin and found myself laying in bed all day for an entire weekend. So I decided to stick around Christchurch for the majority of second term. As a result, I feel like I’ve gotten to explore Christchurch more and get to know some amazing (albeit mostly American) people. I’ve been able to travel around areas Christchurch that I would have never been able to see if I had been traveling as much as I had been. Last weekend, Daniel and I went to an awesome restaurant called Styx and Stones. We ordered two delicious appetizers, one scallop dish and one chicken fingers(I had been craving chicken fingers allll week). Those two dishes were my favorite. For the main course we shared a stone-grill lamb meal. I loved the atmosphere of the restaurants, and all the other dishes that passed us looked equally great. So I guess that means we’ll just have to go back before we come home! 

Within 24 hours this week, I witnessed my first New Zealand snow and earthquake. On Tuesday, it snowed as I headed into my first final, but not enough to stick on the ground. The port hills near Christchurch are now covered in snow, though. On Wednesday, I woke up with a start, as I experienced my first earthquake! Thankfully it was only a 3.5M, but it was still enough to scare me for a few seconds. It was also strong enough to wake many of my friends up (it was at 6:50 am)! Daniel still does not believe me.

Today (Friday), was officially the last day of class. But for me, my classes ended on Tuesday. So I decided to take a short day trip up to Kaikoura, which is about two and a half hours north of Christchurch. I was only there for a day, but I was able to do the Kaikoura Penninsula Walkway, which was a beautiful hike around the peninsula. The weather cooperated with me on my hike, which was important because I wanted to see all the mountains in the background throughout my hike. The mountains were all covered in snow, offering a stunning view of the New Zealand landscape. Also, there were seals. Everywhere. I was actually terrified that I was going to step on one. 

how many seals can you count? 

seal trying to get a sun tan

sheep with snow-capped mountains in the background 

This upcoming week is our official “study week” before finals. Daniel and I will be taking full advantage of this “study week” as we travel around the North Island. Our trip includes a cave rafting tour, a trip to Hobbiton (YES, I did just say Hobbiton), and a hike near Mt. Doom (YES, I did just say Mt. Doom...actually known as the Tongarriro Crossing).

Go Pacers!

Erin 

Weekend in Dunedin

This past weekend a group of us traveled south to Dunedin. Daniel and I took the bus down on Friday and walked around the city until the rest of the group arrived later that night. We all got dinner at a restaurant called the Velvet Burger where I ordered a delicious grilled chicken burger with brie, bacon, and cranberry sauce. 

Saturday morning we woke up bright and early because we wanted to pack as many things in to the day as possible. Thankfully, the weather cooperated much better than we had expected. We took off that morning for the Dunedin Farmer’s Market. I always love walking around farmer’s market and exploring all of the different stalls. There were so many different fruit stands at this market (especially apple stands). Eventually, I decided to buy a lamb wrap for breakfast and then I split a pork dumpling with Daniel. I also bought a few pieces of fruit for the rest of the weekend. 

                                                                      The Dunedin Farmer's Market

From the farmer’s market, we traveled to the Otago Peninsula. This was an absolutely gorgeous drive, and once again I’m reminded of how grateful I am for the wonderful weather we had that day. We drove for about 30 minutes on the peninsula before getting out and walking to Sandfly Bay (thankfully, despite the name, there were no sandflies). We walked, or should I say ran, down a sand dune and ended up at beach. We walked down the beach and found a white seal and 2 very playful (yet still terrifying) sea lions. We walked around the beach for awhile before hiking back up the sand dune. 

                                                                               Pictures of Sandfly Bay

                                                                         Sea Lions at Sandfly Bay

We made one other stop on the Peninsula, where we walked out to the Chasm and Lover’s Leap. Although I enjoyed Sandfly Bay more, the parking lot for these two spots gave us a great lookout over the peninsula. 

                                                                                  View of the Peninsula 

From the peninsula we drove to Baldwin St. which is the steepest residential street in the world. After walking up 270-some steps, we made it to the top. There are houses on this street, but I cannot imagine having to walk or drive up that street everyday. 

                                                                                 Baldwin Street

In the afternoon, we toured the Cadbury Chocolate World Factory. I had been so excited about this, as I always remember receiving Cadbury chocolate eggs on Easter ever since I was little. The tour consisted of receiving small goodie bags of Cadbury Chocolate, watching a short film, walking around the factory, and tasting the most delicious liquid chocolate I have ever tasted. Then, they took us to the retail shop where we all went crazy and bought way too much chocolate. 

Nicole and all of her chocolate 

You might be thinking that our day must have ended there. But it didn’t. From the Cadbury tour we ran over to make a 5 pm tour of the Speight’s Brewery. We learned all about the brewing process and the history of the brewery which I found very interesting. At the end of the tour, our tour guide led us into the bar area where we would be given a tasting of all their beers. After teaching us how to pour the perfect glass of beer, the tour guide said (and I quote) “You have 30 minutes, the bar is yours.” And then he left. We were on the tour with a bunch of Germans, who darted towards the bar. They were having a competition for who could drink the most beers. One of the German women broke the record for how many glasses a woman had drank in that time. She drank 20 glasses. Thankfully (for my mother's sake), we could not keep up with them. 

As I said before, we packed as much as we could into our day in Dunedin. After all of our tours and driving around the peninsula, I feel as if I truly experienced everything in Dunedin that I wanted to. Although it was a busy and tiring weekend, I am glad we squeezed everything in. The next two weeks will be a bit more hectic as I have a few papers due. It is strange that all the schools back home are coming to an end, while I still have 4 more weeks of class followed by a month of finals. Good luck to everyone back home with their finals and graduation!! 

Miss you all,

Erin 

Warning: Long Update, Be Prepared

I’m just going to start out by saying that these past 3 weeks have been some of the best weeks of my life. They were a whirlwind. They went by so quickly at times, while at others, I was praying for our 7 hour hike to end. I loved every minute of everything we did. The weather was beautiful until the last 4 days, but even the rain gave us a much deserved rest from all the hiking, kayaking, and driving. There’s many stories to tell that it’s hard to try to squeeze everything into one blog post. I’ve decided to create a list of my top 10 favorite activities over break and go from there. I’m so indecisive I can’t even put them in rank order, so here they are in order of how they happened: 

Picton Ferry 

Daniel and I traveled to Wellington via the Picton ferry, a four hour ferry that travels through the Queen Charlotte Sound. Lucky for us, it was a beautiful day so we had great views of everything around us. The views from the boat were stunning. The ship, called the Interislander, was as big as a small cruise ship, including a movie theatre, cafeteria, and a lounge area which was perfect for a well-needed nap. Once we turned into the Wellington harbor, you could literally feel how much faster the wind was moving in this area. “Windy Wellington” is definitely an appropriate name. 

View from the Picton Ferry

Wellington

We spent 3 days in Wellington, exploring and eating our way around the city. There are more restaurants per capita in Wellington than in New York City (admittedly, there are many less people, but still!). We walked up and down the streets of the city looking at every menu before finally deciding on a restaurant. I could have spent an entire week there just eating. We walked around Te Papa, New Zealand’s national museum, which I thought was really well done (it reminded me a tad of the Indianapolis Children’s Museum with Lord of the Rings Trolls instead of a giant clock). We also went to Weta Cave, a company that specializes in making props and special effects for movies including the Lord of the Rings (all of the armor in the films came from Weta), King Kong, and Avatar. We took a tour through their workshop with one of their artists, which was really cool to see how they make all of their creations and the different levels of props in movies. Wellington is definitely my favorite city that I’ve visited thus far in New Zealand.

The Trolls in Te Papa

Bay of Islands 

Daniel’s family visited New Zealand our first week of break, and we spent the week traveling around the North Island with them. It was wonderful having them here.For a few days, we all traveled up to the Bay of Islands, which is on the northern end of the north island. We went on a overnight cruise around the islands, and despite a bit of rain, it was an amazing time. The cruise offered kayaking, snorkeling, and walking along the beach for a few hours in the afternoon. Most of the people on the boat were older-aged and did not leave the boat for these excursions, which allowed us to do all three of these activities! I snorkeled for the first time ever, which was awesome! The water was so clear (and a bit chilly) and I was able to see lots of fish. The next day we all went deep sea fishing which was really fun, too. We all caught a bunch of little fish, but Elise and Daniel caught a few fish each that we were able to take back to the hotel and have them cook for dinner! 

Dolphins we saw on our cruise 

Paragliding

After Daniel’s family left, we flew to Queenstown, the land of adventure addicts. I decided that I wanted to paraglide, so I signed up shortly after we arrived. We drove up to Coronet Peak, my take-off site, and in less than 15 minutes I was soaring through the air. The views were spectacular. My guide flew me right near a cliff and over top of trees. During landing, they spin you around a ton, making it feel like a roller coaster ride. I am happy I decided to go ahead and do it. 

The Chasm

After a miscommunication with our kayaking tour, Daniel and I found ourselves free for an afternoon in Milford Sound. We decided to go driving on Milford Sound Rd. where they have a few pull-offs to various look-out points or other attractions. My favorite one we stopped at by far was called the Chasm. It’s hard to describe what it was, so I’ll let pictures do it instead. 

Looking down into the Chasm

The Swimming hole 

Walking back from the Chasm, we spotted a hidden path, which we decided to explore. It led to the bottom of the Chasm where we found a swimming hole. The water was the prettiest water I have ever seen; it was so clear and blue. Daniel made a joke about jumping in, and then there was no turning back. Daniel jumped first, and from my view point, I saw him put his head above the water, look at the water fall, and then bolt as fast he could towards the shore. At this point, as he’s swimming, he’s also yelling “jump, jump, JUMP NOW”, and then I jumped. It was literally the coldest water I have ever felt, and I do not think I even looked towards the water fall, but instead I swam as fast as I have ever swam to get out of that water. I was so thankful we had packed extra thermals with us, as I was freezing cold. It was so much fun, though, and I would do it all over again in a heart beat. 

Kayaking Milford Sound

We were originally scheduled for a twilight kayaking tour. I thought it would be so nice to be out on the water, watching the sunset peacefully with no boats around. This was the exact opposite experience of what we had, but it was hands down my favorite part of the trip. We woke up at 6:30 am that morning to hear it not only raining, but absolutely pouring. I was devastated and thought there was no way they were going to allow us to kayak. Our guide picked us up right at 7, though, cheery as all get out and actually pumped about the rain. We arrived at the boat shed, and they gave all of us our gear, which consisted of brightly coloured (that is spelled correctly in New Zealand, crazy Kiwi’s...) thermals, a spray sheet, and a bright yellow waterproof jacket; we looked insane. 

After explaining how to paddle and adjusting our foot pedals (I had no idea that kayaks even had pedals), they loaded us in the boat and we took off into the fiord. The water was pretty rocky right at the beginning, so their plan was to take us out to the Tasman Sea and drop us out there, but as we were going, I kept seeing white caps and there was no way I was going out on that water. We got out to the Tasman Sea, took a quick look around, and the driver said it was too rough for us to get out, so we found a more secluded area that was a bit smoother for us to unload our boats. After paddling around for a few minute in this sheltered area, our guide explained that the next few minutes were about to be the worst, as they were the narrowest point of the fiord, so all of the wind would be hitting us and waves might get pretty nasty. He was right. He kept yelling at us to lean in to the wind so we wouldn’t tip, waves were coming over us, and I was sure that we going to tip a few times. Daniel and I paddled as hard as we could, and with that winds at our back, we flew through that section. We came less that 10 ft. from hitting a cliff, but thankfully we avoided it. When we passed that section, I was finally able to breathe for a second. Our guide said he had never seen a kayak move as quickly as ours did. It was definitely a wild adventure. The rest of the trip was much smoother; it even stopped raining a bit so we could take a few pictures. 

Copland Trek 

On our drive up the west coast, we had planned to do a hike called the Copland Trek up to the Welcome Flat Hut. I was a little hesitant about doing this because I tweaked my ankle a few weeks before break, but the hike ended up being very easy and doable. It claimed to be a 7-hour hike, but it was relatively flat with little elevation gain. What I loved about the hike was that we were essentially through a rainforest. Everything around us was damp, and we were surrounded by the most green landscape I have ever seen, and the birds in there never stopped singing. It was like no other terrain I have ever seen. 

It also helped that our hike ended at a hut that had a natural hot spring 2 minutes away with an amazing view of the Sierra Range glaciers. 

West Coast Drive

From Fox Glacier, we continued to drive (or should I say Daniel continued to drive) up the West Coast. There was a particular stretch from a town called Greymouth (prounounced Greymyth) to Westport that was the prettiest drive I have ever driven. Our guide book claimed it was one of the top 10 coastal drives in the world, and I believe it. We were driving along the coast the entire stretch. We made two stops throughout the stretch, one in Punakaki National Park. This national park is known for their pancake rocks, which stack high on top of each other. We also walked through a cave at this stop. 

Later down the road, we stopped at a beach, where we walked along the shore. Overall, it was a beautiful drive and I’m glad we decided to extend our time on the West Coast in order to do it. 

Wine Tour

Our 3-week vacation just so happened to end on my birthday. We planned to do a wine tour on my birthday, the ideal way to celebrate my 21st birthday. The wine tour was amazing, not only because of the wine but also because of the people we were traveling around with. There was a group of 20-something year old Austrailian girls and two 50 year old Austrailian sisters both traveling from Australia. The group was hilarious and it was a great time getting to know all of them. The wine tastings themselves were really enjoyable, as well. I particularly liked an organic Sauvignon Blanc from Geisens winery. This was a great way to celebrate both my 21st and an end to an amazing 3-weeks. 

Cloudy Bay Winery

Food

So I know this isn’t really an activity we did, but it’s hard not to talk about all the food we ate over the past three weeks. When we were traveling with Daniel’s family, my favorite restaurant we went to was called Soul in Auckland. In the guidebook, this restauraunt claimed to be Beyonce’s favorite restauraunt in Auckland. The food was absolutely to die for, and we got a feijoa fruit tart that was my favorite dessert of the week. We asked our waitress at the end of our meal if Beyonce truly eats at the restaurant, and she replied that not only does she eat there, but she even sits at the table we were sitting at! We also ate at a delicious fish & chips place in the Bay of Islands called Shippeys, accurately named for being in a large ship. 

In Queenstown, we ate at a restaraunt called Fergburgers, a popular place for backpackers because of their huge, yet cheap, burgers. The burger was literally the largest burger I have ever seen; it came with two patties. On our way out of Queenstown, we stopped at a fruit stand, where we bought dried kiwi, dried chocolate covered kiwi, and lots of fresh fruit for our roadtrip. 

Overall, the trip was amazing; I can’t really find the words to describe how much I enjoyed everything we did. Although it was a great time, I’m glad to be back in Christchurch, where I will be able to stay put (at least for a few days) and made home cooked meals for awhile. This trip was definitely a once in a lifetime kind of trip, and I am so, incredibly grateful for everything I was able to do. 

Hope everyone is enjoying some Spring weather(or snow if you’re in good ol’ St. Paul!)! 

Erin 

See you in 3 weeks

Hi All! 

Even though I had much studying to do this weekend, I was still able to find time to have some adventures. New Zealand, with it’s beautiful weather and everything there is to do, makes it very, very difficult for me to force myself to study for midterms. 

Friday night’s weather was beautiful. It was mid-60s and sunny all day, but unfortunately I spent the entire afternoon in the library. There’s an outdoor bar not too far away that I’ve passed by multiple times. It just looked like a really chill place so I decided to check it out on Friday. So a small group of us traveled over there after dinner. It was exactly my kind of bar. It was outside on a beautiful night, there was a small band playing live music, and they had bean bag and lawn chairs. It was a really chill, but fun time. Then, the topic of a tim-tam slammed arose. A tim-tam is one of hte most delicious, chocolate cookies I have ever eaten(they might even be better than oreos). A tim-tam slam is when you bite off the opposite corners of the cookie and drink either hot chocolate or coffee through it like a straw. So we left the bar to go get “tim-tam slammed”, which was the best thing ever. 

Saturday morning I went to the farmers market with a bunch of people. Daniel and I split a cinnamon scone and a raspberry &white chocolate crepe. There were too many choices for us to just pick one. We also bought lamb sausages which we cooked tonight for dinner. After that I spent the afternoon studying until it was time to get ready for the Crusader’s rugby game. The Crusaders is the regional rugby team, and we had awesome seats for the game. We were in the first row behind one of the goal posts. The atmosphere of the game was so much fun. They played music the entire time, even when the game was going, and the crowd did the wave so much. 

Yesterday,  Daniel and I traveled with a girl in my program and a guy we met in the Tramping Club to Cave Stream. Cave Stream is literally just as it sounds: a cave with a stream running through it. You just walk straight through the stream all around the cave. At somepoints the water was above my waist, and it was pretty chilly for an hour hike. I really enjoyed it, mostly because this isn’t something you can find in the U.S. If this was in the U.S, a company would own it, run tours, and develop a commercial area. But here, the cave is left exactly as is, and anyone can drive up and just walk on through. 

I just have to get through the next 3 days that are filled with 2 midterms and a project, and then I’m home free for 3 weeks. My 3-week Fall Break officially starts on Friday, and I will be traveling for the entire time. Daniel and I will be traveling with his family on the North Island for the first week, and then flying back to the south end of the South Island and driving the entire West coast. We’ll be kayaking, hiking, and doing a wine tour. I won’t be able to update while I am away, but there will definitely be a long blog post as soon as I return. 

Until then,

Erin 

Bushwhacking through Cow Pies in a Cloud

This past weekend Daniel and I decided we wanted to visit the town of Akaroa, a French Bay colony about an hour and a half drive from Christchurch. Wanting to make it more of an adventure, we decided to hike there. 

Friday afternoon we took the city bus to Ltylleton and then the ferry across to Diamond Harbor. From the harbor, we hiked for about 4 hours up to Mt. Herbert. We were mostly hiking on farmland through the Canterbury plains, scaring off sheep as we tramped. We had great views of harbor behind us and could see farm land for miles ahead of us. After climbing 900m uphill, we finally reached our shelter for the night. We decided to set up our tent inside the shelter just to stay warmer. We arrived at the shelter just in time to see a beautiful sunset.

I thought we were finally out of the farm lands, but boy, was I wrong. After falling asleep for a few hours, both Daniel and I woke up suddenly to noises outside. All of the sudden we heard feet shuffling around. The conversation went as followed: 

Erin: I think there’s a sheep on the roof

Daniel:There’s no way there’s a sheep on the roof

(something runs across our porch and jumps onto the roof) 

Erin: There’s definitely a sheep on the roof. 

Then, the unfortunate happened. I had to go to the bathroom. Of course, I forced Daniel to go outside with me because if I’m going to get attacked by an animal, I don’t want to be alone. We went outside, and while we could not tell if it was a sheep on our roof, we did see some kind animal but thankfully we scared it away. 

When we woke up Saturday morning, we were completely above the cloud line. 

Above the clouds

We took off on our hike Saturday, hoping the clouds would rise. This, unfortunately never happened. For the first two hours of our hike, we were walking through cow and sheep farms. There were several instances where cows were on our trail. Most of the time, they would move. Other times, I was convinced that they were going to charge at us if we walked any closer. Walking through these farms also meant walking through tons and tons of cow pies. My shoes are currently sitting out on my porch so they don’t stink up my room. 

Daniel, the cow herder 

After avoiding all the cows and and finding the correct trail, Daniel and I found ourselves  literally walking through a cloud the rest of the day. The fog did not help us, as we were just piecing together several trails by following a map. Thankfully, Daniel is a skilled map reader and we were able to get on the right trail. 

Towards the end of the trail, we walked through an area that was just like a rainforest. While we did not get the beautiful views we were expecting because of the clouds, I loved all the different settings we were able to hike through. 

After 8 hours of hiking on Saturday, we finally reached our destination, The Hilltop Tavern. We ate a declicious pizza, and decided we needed to continue on our way to Akaroa. The Hilltop Tavern was 18 km from Akaroa, and neither Daniel or I wanted to hike that much further. So we hitched a ride with a family from Germany down 15 km and then hiked the last 3 km to Akaroa. 

We spent Saturday evening and Sunday morning exploring the town of Akaroa. It was a cute town with lots of little shops, but the weather was iffy on Sunday so we decided to catch an early shuttle back to Christchurch. Overall, the weekend was a lot of fun. I was glad we decided to hike through the Banks Penninsula, as we were able to see the Canterbury Plains and I think it’s a huge accomplishment to say that we hiked our way to Akaroa. 

Sorry for such a long post. Happy St. Patricks Day in the States, everyone! 

Erin 

Beer, Mussels, and Rock Climbing

This weekend has been much more relaxing compared to my previous two weekend trips. Because I had a mandatory fieldtrip on Sunday, I decided to hang around Christchurch on Friday & Saturday. On Friday, after my classes ended at noon, Daniel and I spent the rest of the afternoon at the beach in New Brighton. It was a beautiful day, and as we are slowly transitioning to fall weather, I want to take full advantage of all the nice weather. We walked up and down the shore, laid out on the beach, and walked around the little stores in town. On our way back to campus, we stopped and picked up some DELICIOUS Thai food for dinner. 

I had a very relaxed morning on Saturday. I tried to get as much work completed as I could while also trying to plan more trips for the semester. Saturday afternoon I went to the Belgium Beer and Mussels Festival. There were lots of booths at the festival with tons of beer, live music, and then a food truck that sold different varieties of mussels. I went to the festival with two of my friends, Nicole and Erika, who unfortunately were into beer and mussels as much I was. I could have stayed at the festival all day. In the end, I did try a variety of mussels which were delicious and a traditional Belgium beer to go along with them. 

Today I had my rockclimbing fieldtrip for the climbing class I am taking. We traveled out to Castle Hill, which is a popular place for bouldering. It was my first real experience with outdoor climbing so I was a bit unsure about how I would do. We learned many techniques for climbing and then were given different routes/rocks to try these techniques on. Overall, I thought I did pretty well, much better than I expected. I was able to get more of a feel for what I’m capable of doing climbing-wise and what I’ll need to work on this semester. My body is so sore from climbing all day, and my feet are screaming at me for wearing climbing shoes 2 sizes too small. I’m excited to go back to Castle Hill in May for our 2nd fieldtrip, though, to see how much I’ve improved through taking this course. On our way back to Christchurch, we stopped at a famous pie shop, where I bought ate a delicious Moroccan lamb meat pie for dinner followed by a cherry pie for dessert. 

Sorry for the lack of pictures this week. Hope everyone is doing well! Miss you all,

Erin 

Weekend Tramping Trip

Hi everyone!! 

This past weekend I traveled with a group of 10 people to Nelson Lakes National Park, located about 5 1/2 hours north of Christchurch. It was a very large group of us, but we all had a great time tramping around the park. We arrived mid-afternoon on Friday, just in time to start our hike in the dead heat of the day. We hiked up to Angelus Hut via the ridge line on Friday, which was a very difficult hike for the first two hours, but the we were rewarded with beautiful views from the ridge. 

Pictures from our hike on Friday

Friday night, I stayed in Angelus Hut because all of the campsites had already been booked. This hut was about 3-4x larger than the hut we stayed in last weekend at Arthur’s Pass. It had two large bunkrooms that fit about 20 people each and a large kitchen and dining area. The hut was also situated next to two lakes, making for a beautiful surrounding view. 

On Saturday, I woke up really early and ventured outside to read until everyone else woke up. As I walked outside, the other hikers in the hut were racing outside with their cameras. I decided something exciting must be happening, so I ran out with them, only to see the most breath-taking sunrise I have ever seen. 

Picture of the Sunrise

The group decided to take it easy for the most part on Saturday. I read my book while soaking in the views of mountains and lakes. About mid-morning we decided to take an “easy” hike up to Angelus Peak. My legs were pretty tired from the day before, so I didn’t make it all the way to the peak. A group of us stopped about 1/3 of the way from the top and decided to eat our lunch there instead of making the rest of the journey to the top. 

We left Angelus Hut early Sunday morning, taking an alternative route back to the car park. Instead of hiking back over the ridge, we hiked down through the valley. We walked through the trees, along the river, and more importantly, in the shade most of the day. This was a much easier hike than the other two days and thankfully my pack was lighter due to most of my food being gone. Needless to say, I have definitely been pushed myself physically the past two weekends.

This upcoming weekend I have a field-trip to Castle Hill with my rock-climbing class. I plan on taking it easy the rest of the weekend, hopefully going to the farmer’s market or heading to the beach if it’s nice.

That’s it for now! 

Erin