Birthday and the beginning of BREAK!

Well, I’ve been slacking on my blogging recently! So I guess we should go back to where I left off, which was my birthday!

My birthday was lots of fun. Laura, Nicole, Jessica and I got dressed in our best and started out at Laura’s house with a few drinks. After some giggling, we headed down to dinner at an Italian place in town which was yummy. It was a Wednesday, so you might expect that it would be pretty empty in town, but Wednesday is student night so we were expecting a decent crowd. However, we never found this crowd of people who apparently go out, and neither did some of the bars we were planning to frequent. Therefore, two were closed before we arrived and the other two took forever to serve our drinks. We did get to visit a cool new bar called The Library. You can see why it might appeal to a bookworm such as myself. It was pretty crowded so we couldn’t look around, but a return trip is definitely in order. After we had exhausted our list of bars to check out, we stopped at McDonalds on the way home for a family meal. It was trickier that you would have thought, since they were ridiculously understaffed and there were a lot of students along with us. Overall, the food and drinks were good and the company was fantastic, so I couldn’t have asked for anything better!

The next morning Mom and Dad were supposed to arrive around 8:30am. However, the day before Anna and I had been skyping when she found out that their plane had been delayed out of Dulles, giving them only five minutes to make it to their connecting flight in San Francisco. Needless to say, it didn’t happen. They got rerouted to Sydney and came back to Wellington later that afternoon. Luckily I was just getting back in that night when Anna messaged me at 2AM my time to let me know that they wouldn’t be getting in until later. They finally made it in around 3PM and managed to stay awake until about 7PM. However, no luggage arrived with them. Luckily my s’mores materials were in Mom’s carry-on bag, although my macaroni and cheese was lost at sea. A few days later before we headed off on our South Island adventure, the luggage arrived along with my two birthday cards and scarf from Anna and my Jif peanut butter, Swiss Miss, and Kraft Mac & Cheese. Now I’m set until July! For the next few days I showed them around town…in the rain. The three most solid days of rain that Wellington has had since I arrived in February, in fact. So we didn’t see as much as I had hoped, but still all the important bits. We even had a belated birthday dinner with Laura, Nicole and Jessica. Although the food was good, the atmosphere was deafening, and literally no conversation could be had if you didn’t feel like screaming your head off at someone else so they could hear you. Oh well, better luck next time. I got lots of exercise over those few days as one of the largest hills I have encountered in Wellington separated my house from their hotel. Mom and Dad started to climb it one day to come see me, but Dad decided to avoid what he felt was the eminent heart attack and head back down to take the cable car. 

On Monday, we headed to the Interislander Ferry to get to Picton at the top of the South Island. The weather was not exactly ideal, and the crossing was a little rough at the beginning, but luckily we had inadvertently picked the most secure spot in the ferry and we were bobbing around less than everyone else. After a nap, I woke up to find the waters much calmer as we approached Picton. After disembarking and grabbing our luggage, we headed to the rental car place. Our rental car is, you might say, less than ideal. It’s about fifteen years old, has about 200,000 kilometers on it, and sounds like it’s fighting you every time you hit an incline. Exciting.

After a scenic drive to Nelson in the dark, we located our hotel in Monaco shortly afterwards and were directed to our cottage. I had two beds and a bathroom all to myself…as I told Mom at the time, I don’t think I’ve ever had a bathroom of my own before. It was a little overwhelming, but somehow I managed. The next day we headed out to Abel Tasman National Park, where I’ve been trying to get to since I arrived in Wellington. It did not disappoint. We were able to walk right along the coastline and see both the beach and the bush. After stopping for some lunch in a shady spot, we did a short bushwalk and then headed back along the coast to the car. After arriving back in Monaco, we took a walk into town and got some produce, groceries, and fish n chips takeaway for dinner. Yum! Except then we had to race back to the hotel in order to eat while it was hot…on the way, the sun was setting so I tried to get a few pictures on the run.

The next day (Wednesday for those keeping track) we headed into the town of Nelson. While we were waiting for the art gallery to open, we walked through the gardens and saw some more ducks. There are lots of ducks in New Zealand, at least in the parts where I have visited. They are fun to watch, especially when they are quacking or showering. After a brief wander through the art gallery and a stop at the cathedral for some pictures for Jessica, we were on the road to Hokitika. We arrived several hours later at our beachfront chalet…fancy! It’s not quite right on the water, but a short walk away. We went for a rather lengthy walk on the beach and ended up on the other side of town. Stopping to get dinner, we then headed to the grocery store to get some breakfast for the next day and trekked home in the dark. We all had electric blankets in our beds, but we didn’t discover the heater for the room until the next morning…whoops. While the night started out fine, albeit a little chilly, turns out the people staying next door have kids who rival elephants and hyenas simultaneously. Impressive, but it meant little sleep for us. So far tonight they have not returned…fingers crossed that the kids are tired out and actually sleep at night? 

Today (Thursday) we traveled back up the coast a little but to Punakaiki, where there are pancake rocks and blowholes. We got there right at high tide which was perfect, since the waves were crashing against the rocks and causing the blowholes to blow water everywhere. The drive there and back was also one of the more scenic ones so far (which is saying something), as we were right along the coastline for a while. After looking at the many jade outlets in Hokitika, we came back for a brief respite and I grabbed some more sunset pictures on the beach before we headed out for Indian food. For my first true experience with it (when we were kids, we just ate piles of Naan), I was pleasantly surprised. As long as I stick with the mild spice, then I should be good. Even Dad’s medium dish was too spicy for my liking. Yes, I am a weakling. Now we’re back in our chalet, resting up for tomorrow’s drive to the Fox and Franz Josef Glaciers. We had originally planned to drive over the mountains towards the east coast to Fairlie before heading down to Wanaka, but with our whiny rental car and bad weather heading this way, we’re going to skip the mountains and drive further down the coast. Also, tomorrow is Good Friday—although this may not mean much to most people back at home, in New Zealand it means everything is closed. This includes restaurants (even the Chinese ones) and the grocery stores. Luckily, we stocked up today (along with the rest of Hokitika…the parking lot was packed every time we drove past it). Tomorrow we shall dine like kings on ginger beer, spaghetti and leftover Indian. Yum.