Day 4: Caving

Coolest thing I have ever done. Hands down.

We took a bus to Waitomo from Rotorua, which took about 2 hours.  We traveled through glorious country side and our group split into two: one group went to the TumuTumu Waterhole Caves and the other went to Haggas Honking Holes. The first group was more of a leisurely raft into glow worm caves on tubes. The second group was repelling down a 65 foot drop and then two waterfalls. I said to myself "YOLO" and I did the second one.

Oh. my. god. I was terrified when we started. They loaded us up with wet suits, rain boots, helmets, head lamps, and a harness. We were in the middle of no where on some Kiwi's farm practicing repelling down the side of a steep hill. Our guide showed us how to set up the rope and lower ourselves down a grassy knoll, said "Yup, you're ready!" and took us into the cave. We were about 20 feet under when we already had no light. He told us the first thing we would do is repel down the 65 foot drop. I was the last to go. And I heard every girl's high pitched scream and every guy's manly shout beforehand. My guide helped me to the ledge, I tied my rope onto my harness and he pushed me into the black abyss. I slowly but surely made my way down without screaming, and when my feet touched the bottom, I felt like a complete bad ass. That is, until my 55 year old guide literally grabbed a rope in either hand and physically ran down the wall like he was Indiana Jones.


We spent about 3 hours underground, during which time we repelled down 2 thirty foot waterfalls and crawled in spaces I though were only meant for the dwarves in Lord of the Rings. I thought the goblins were going to make an appearance, though luckily they did not. I did do a very nice Gandalf "You Shall Not Pass" impression, which I think my friend Claire would definitely have appreciated at that venue in particular.

The hardest part of caving was getting out. We had to climb up shear rock faces with just rubber boots on. In many circumstances, we had to be attached with ropes just in case we slipped, even when we climbed ladders.  At one point, I reached the top of the tallest ladder to meet my guide and the people before me. "Where are they?" I thought we were at a dead end. "Up there," he says pointing to a small hole in the ceiling. "And I'm supposed to climb that, with no rope and no one to help me while you help the next person up?" "Yup," he says and tosses down the rope to the next one. I thought this was some sort of sick joke. I found a couple foot holes about an inch deep and clawed my way up. When I got my shoulders through the 90 degree angle hole, I was forced to let my feet off of the footholds and let my legs dangle as I yanked myself through. Totally thought I was going to slip out, fall on my guide and fall down the waterfall with the ladder below me. Somehow I remembered my army crawl training from racing my brother through the obstacle course through my house when I was a kid (god your brilliant mom, who would have known you would save my life with that 15 years later) and squeezed my way through. HAZAHH!

We made out way back to the surface after going through some really cool caves with glow worms and huge stalactites and stalagmites. Apparently, it takes 100 years for a stalactite/mite to grow one centimeter. Which meant that the ones we saw were hundreds of thousands of years old. Sweet-as Bro!

FUN FACT #4: Kiwi's use the word "as" pretty much as a synonym to "super". The most popular is "Sweet-as" but there is also "Cool-as". My favorite is "Pissed-as" which essentially means you are very very drunk.

Once above, we found our friends the sheep again and peeled off the wetsuits to meet the other group for lunch. It was a beautiful day, but needless to say we all slept on the way home. When we got back, our Global Links fearless leader "Tyme" held a talent show.

FUN FACT #5: One thing that no one ever mentions about New Zealand is the fact that the internet here SUCKS! There is no such thing as free wi-fi here. Except at McDonalds, Burger King, and Wendy's. (American represents!!!)

In any case, I was not willing to pay for internet at the hostel. But when Tyme said that one of the prizes was a $10 internet card I said, "Sign me up!!"My friend Amy and I did a lovely rendition of Nicki Minaj's "Super Bass" complete with rap and chorus. We got third place, thereby earning $10 each for wi-fi. Heellllsss yeahhh!

I headed to bed, ready for the next day at the Beach!!!

Day 3: Day of Adventure

 By far, this was the most exhausting day of the trip. Hang on tight everybody.

We began with breakfast at the hostel followed by a short bus ride to a white water rafting hut near the Kaituna River.  After fitting us with helmets, life jackets, and water shoes we were loaded back onto the buses where our kiwi instructors gave us  some safety tips. Swinging around bends on windy roads in New Zealand while still getting used to driving on the opposite side of the road made it rather difficult to convert meters to feet when she told us we were going to travel down a 7 meter drop (I found out later was about 23 feet). But I WAS able to hear that this was a Class 5 rapid river, which I know is pretty damn rough. My favorite part was when they said this drop was the highest commercially rafted waterfall in the Southern Hemisphere. Whelp, good thing I didn't tell my family about this until afterwards... (I'm fine Grandma, no worries)

That's me in front, laughing like an idiot

Before entering the rafts, we asked the River in the Maori language for safe passage. (or our instructors did and we listened respectfully) While we were traveling on the river, our guide told us a story about how the Maori warriors used the ferns in "the bush" (or woods) to lead them back to their villages after night time raids. One side of the fern is green, the other side is silver. The silver would shine in the moonlight, so Maori warriors would mark their way so their friends would be able to follow. Our guide pulled a leaf off of a fern and gave it to me. He said I had to fling it over my shoulder, and if it landed on silver we would make it over the falls without flipping over. If it landed on green... DUN DUN DUN...  we would flip.

Annnnddd...... it landed on green. "It's only 80% correct... usually," he tells me. Awesome. Just awesome. But we didn't flip! I did drop my paddle though, which I was promptly thrown out of the boat for and ordered to go get it. Whoopsies...

On another part of the river, our guide made us jump in the water and go down the rapids on our backs. I definitely got a nose and mouthful of water, but it was still really cool.

After White Water Rafting, we snagged some fish and chips and then met up with the rest of our Global Links Family to go "Ogo-ing". For those of you who don't know what that is, it is the same as "Zorbing". Essentially, you climb in a big rubber ball which is suspended by springs inside another big rubber ball. They pour water inside and you roll and splash down the side of a mountain. And holll---yyyyyy crap is it fun!

After Ogo, a few friends and I hit a South American Restaurant before we headed to Polynesian Spas. Expecting it to be relaxing after our long day of fun, I was very disappointed. I have never seen so many people crowded in once place in my life. And if I thought the geo-thermal pools outside our hostel was smelly, I obviously had never been to a natural spring spa before. Yick. If I could do it all again, I definitely would not have gone. Oh well, you win some and you lose some. But I will say this: the sunset was gorgeous while sitting in a hot pool. 

We rinsed off the stink and headed out to the Rotorua Bars. We went to"Pig and Whistle" which had live music. Oddly enough, they played all American Classic Rock songs... which of course I knew every word to (thanks mom and dad). Had a blast there with our $1 drink coupons, then headed home. Next day was CAVING!

Day 2: Haka in Rotorua

FUN FACT #1: Kiwis have an obsession with this condiment called "Marmite". Apparently, they put it on their toast for breakfast. (It's nasty, I don't recommend it-- don't believe was Rocket Power tells you as a kid) New Zealand's Marmite factory needed serious repairs after the earth quake here last year, and Kiwis have had to rely on Australian "Vegemite" instead. According to them, the Australian version is terrible. But I suppose that is very similar to us saying U.S. bacon is better than Canadian bacon. Anyways, Marmite comes back on March 25th, or so my Kiwi friend keeps telling me. Oh so exciting...

I had my first run in with Vegemite this morning, and lets just say it was less than pleasant. But shortly after, we left for Rotorua, which is a town/city in the lower part of the North Island. It was about a 4 hour bus ride which was accompanied by magnificent views of the New Zealand country side. I saw more cows and sheep than I ever have in my life (which is saying something considering I'm from Vermont).

FUN FACT #2: New Zealand has no O-Zone Layer. In other words, you burn to a crisp in 10 minutes without sun screen. Many girls on the trip learned this lesson the hard way.

After arriving in Rotorua, we were met with a very distinctive aroma... that of rotting eggs. Conveniently outside our hostel are geo-thermal pools. Very cool to look at: they are pale pale green and bubble constantly. But they also smell like crap. No joke, you can always get away with farts in Rotorua. Always. Okay, moving on...

As we were still jet lagged, our first day in Rotorua was met with more information about our "Bridging Cultures" experience. We learned about New Zealand geography and some travel options after we had a barbeque.

FUN FACT #3: New Zealand ketchup, otherwise known as "Tomato Sauce" is absolutely disgusting. After our first week in Rotorua, we were so desperate for real ketchup we were stealing handfuls from McDonald's and Wendy's at every opportunity. Luckily, Heinz does exist here. Although it costs you an arm and a leg, it's definitely worth it. We now carry bottles around with us to barbecues like Vermonters bring syrup to brunch in other states. Classy huh?

When our information session was finished, we were taught the "Haka". The Maori people are the native tribes of New Zealand. They make up about 15% of the population here today. Maori tribes were constantly fighting over land before the Europeans arrived. They would perform the "Haka" as a dance before they went to battle. It consisted of painting your face, clapping, singing/yelling, and protruding your eyes and sticking your tongue out at people. The intent was to scare the enemy enough that they would yield and retreat so that no blood was shed. Today, the famous New Zealand rugby team, the All Blacks, perform this dance before games.

Every tribe sings a different version, but most sound very similar (at least to me). We were dressed in Maori fashion and painted our faces and did the Haka. It was very cool, and very intense. There was a lot of screaming and yelling involved, but our group did it well. 

Afterwards, we headed back to the hostel. Being a party pooper, I stayed in for the night and slept early. Next day was our DAYYY OFFF ADDVEENNTTUURREEEE!!!!! 

Day 1- Jet lag

"I hopped of the plane at LAX" and immediately found my fellow UVMers. As one of the only elementary education study abroad options, there are quite a few of us in New Zealand for the semester.    Six of us in total went through a study abroad company called "Global Links Learning Abroad". The company set up our housing for us as well as planned trips and flights. The first week in New Zealand is known as our "Bridging Cultures Program".  Essentially, we spend some time getting to know some other Americans who are going to the same college (Auckland University of Technology) and get acquainted with the country and do some cool stuff.

These UVM friends were all girls who I had had class with, but never really hung out with other than doing school work. Six hours waiting for our next flight definitely lent us some serious bonding time. We met a couple of other kids who were in Global Links as well, and we boarded the plane.

As most people know, (or unless you've lived under a rock the past 10 years) the Lord of the Rings movies as well as the Hobbit were all filmed in New Zealand. So naturally, one would assume that would be a source of pride for Kiwis. But I would now have to say that the word "pride" is bit of an understatement. As shown by the Flight Safety video shown to start off our 12 hour flight.

I bet you can all guess what the top 3 movies were on the flight there?? 

For those of you who don't know, Auckland is New Zealand's largest city. It is located on the North Island and contains about 1 million of the 4 million total population. Once we arrived at the Auckland International Airport, we met up with the rest of our Global Links Group. There were 24 of us in total, and we were brought to our hotel to drop off our stuff. As Vermonters, we had the furthest flights of everyone in the group, and our dragging feet showed it. 

We had our first of 3 info sessions to acquaint ourselves with some of the New Zealand culture and history and then we hit the water front. It was positively beautiful, especially when knowing that this was to be my city for the next 12 weeks. 

After my first LEGAL beer (sorry mom and dad.... you knew it would happen eventually) we hit up a cheesy Italian Restaurant and headed to bed. I would have explored Auckland all that night, but jet lag got the best of me. The next day we headed for Rotorua.

Peace out, America

So today is the day! Finally heading to New Zealand! I'm flying out from Boston to LAX, then LAX to Auckland. After babysitting, making pizza, picking blueberries, teaching, painting houses, cleaning cars, mowing lawns, washing windows, and waiting tables, I am finally leaving to study abroad. Thank you to all of the people who helped me along the way.... Mr. Gilbert, Mrs. Veller, The Chamberlains, The Varneys, The Hathaway Family, A Crust Above, The Pryors, Rutland City Public Schools, and Trader Dukes at the Double Tree. Thanks to my family for helping me; Mom, Dad, Joe, Grandma and Grandpa, you guys rock.

• Also, a special thank you to those who let me crash at their homes for free: Thanks Club Colchester, 30 School, and 163.5 So. Union. I really couldn't ask for any better friends. You know who you are :)

So here I go! Next post will be from New Zealand!!