Music: New Zealand Edition

So I’ve heard a few New Zealand artists here that I really like mainly because they play at work all day or on one of the three TV channels we actually have in our apartment. The first is Gin Wigmore and I currently like Too Late for Lovers, Hey Ho, and Under My Skin. Very Unique voice. 

And the second artist is Zowie. I’ve only heard one song of hers called Broken Machine but it’s very catchy.

Sam and I also recently went to Big Day Out which is a huge concert here with sooo many artists.

Some highlights:

• Kids of 88 who were amazing! My House and Just A little Bit were my favorite.
• The Naked and the Famous were good – two songs Punching in a Dream and Young Blood are really good
• John Butler Trio has a song which apparently has been out for a while but I just heard it recently – Lion Man – it’s amazing.

We went from almost 11 in the morning to 11 at night. We also had to come up with some creative ways to sneak in alcohol aka putting vodka in an All Purpose seasoning bottle strapped to my leg....it was like prom all over again. We even got to cut the line and be VIP because one of the security guards there is a bouncer at Fox’s. Yeah, were kind of a big deal.

BEFORE PICTURE

AFTER PICTURE

 As you can tell from the before and after pictures, it was a fun, crazy, rainy, and long day.

That Time We Planned A Trip We Already Took

 So our manager Ashley is from Canada and had two of her friends from back home coming for a visit. They had planned a trip to the Bay of Islands and Sam and I happened to have off those same days and they invited us along. 

 We ended up staying in the same town and hostel that we went to on our first ever Loyola organized trip the first week we got to New Zealand. It was so funny/weird to be back and compare the two experiences and how different they were. Last time we were still getting to know everyone and everything was new. Our last trip was also jam packed with every tourist-y thing there was to do. 

This time around, we just got to relax on the beach and actually go into the main town and wonder/explore. We also took a ferry ride over to Russell and got drinks right on the water and watched a live band play – nothing too fancy, basically two guys trying to raise money to get to Australia. It was nice to travel with other people for a change as well. 

Coromandel: Home of the Lukewarm Water Beaches

         We finally had days off from work so we planned our first real trip out of the city! We went to Coromandel and stayed in Coromandel Town which was a very small cute town. 

       The first day we got there, we rented bikes from our hostel and biked down to a local beach. We didn’t have on bathing suits so we decided to come back another day. Biking was one of my favorite parts of the trip. I felt so young and carefree. That night we decided to go out to dinner. Coromandel is known for their mussels and oysters so we went to a restaurant called Pepper Tree and got oyster shots with tomato juice.....Needless to say, I don’t think I’ll be having oysters again in the very near future.

Baby Beluga

      
  The next day, we had planned to go to a hot water beach and Cathedral Cove (which was in the movie Narnia apparently?) The day before we had organized a rental car so we could drive ourselves. We show up at the gas station to pick it up – it was a cute little blue car that we named Baby Beluga. We got in, put our stuff in the back and were ready to head off! – then we realized the car was manual. 

 Since neither of us can drive stick shift, we had to walk down to the other part of town and get a rental car from another company. We were lucky they were able to give it to us on such short notice! This time it was a silver Nissan we named Bernice – and we were off! – for real this time. 

Bernice!

         Sam drove first on a road called 309 which isn’t really paved and is very narrow and windy, but we made it out alive! On the way, we even stopped at a little stand and bought some Manuka Honey which NZ is known for. We made up a road trip scavenger hunt to keep the car ride fun, such as get currency from another country and take a picture with a live animal – which almost got me killed by a cow with horns, but that’s a story for another time. 

Scavenger Hunt List

Currency from different countries - Check!

         We went to the hot water beach first, rented shovels, and started digging. It wasn’t too packed, but we couldn’t really find a spot that was hot anywhere so we ended up with a little lukewarm bath instead of a hot water pool. We even went in the water and I wanted to ride the waves but it was impossible to get passed them before they broke and I almost died trying so we went back to the safety of our kiddie pool....

         Then we went to Cathedral Cove and we had to walk about 45 minutes to get there. I swear halfway there I wanted to turn around and someone was like don’t worry it’s worth it...and it was. Absolutely beautiful. We were actually able to swim in this water and we swam out to a giant rock and jumped off. We then went down to another bay by Cathedral Cove called Gemstone Bay and you get to the end of the stairs and its literally all rocks straight to the water! It was very difficult to finally make it down but we managed and then we went snorkeling. I was scared of sharks and I just had to tell myself that it’s shallow water and there are no sharks there – and then one of the next days we heard there was an 8 meter Great White in shallow waters right by Cathedral Cove....

 

        
        I drove the rest of the way home. I’m sure Sam was scared for her life but I managed to do a pretty decent job. Krissy would have been sick to her stomach with my driving but she wasn’t there to complain. 

        Sadly, the next day there was a cyclone and the weather was crap so couldn’t go back to that first beach like we had planned. We sat in the hostel and Sam watched ‘Into the Wild’ while I passed out on the other couch. Not the day we had planned, but it was so nice to be out of Auckland for a change and finally be able to travel a bit more.

One Day We Went to Rangi-To-To...

It's actually spelled Rangitoto, but for some reason whenever Sam says the word, she insists on pronouncing every syllable and ends up sounding like an old woman. (If anyone has seen Salad Fingers on Youtube, it is very similar to how he says 'rusty spoons'...creepy I know) 

Rangitoto is another dormant volcano around Auckland, but it’s interesting because it’s uninhabited. There's no stores, cafes, or anything. There are a few historic baches on the island, but now they are just for show and no one lives there.

We packed a lunch, took the ferry over, and started our hike. It was interesting to hike up because the trail was surrounded by dark volcanic rock (which I thought was soil at first haha). After about an hour, we took a detour to travel through some lava caves. It was cool to think that they were once formed by lava and now, years and years later, were just walking through them. A half hour later, we reached the top and it was one of my favorite views so far. It was a lot higher than Devonport and I was able to see the Skytower and Harbor Bridge together.

Volcanic rock on Rangitoto

Lava caves

Once we got down to the bottom, we had to wait for the ferry so we walked around and looked at some of the old baches. There was also a cement pool that was empty when we got there, but then when the tide came in, it filled up and was like an actual swimming pool. We put our feet in for a while and relaxed until the ferry finally came to take us home. I don't really remember what we did when we got back to the apartment, but if I know myself at all I probably followed my active and healthy day with some ice cream and a nap! Hey, baby steps...

Arsty photo shot curtesy of Ms. Nicole Riverso