In May of 2009, I left my south-eastern comfort zone and headed out to the land of the Kiwis. We spent 23 days exploring the South Island, visiting popular tourist sites, learning about Maori culture, and learning about New Zealand's approach to sustainable living.
An Introduction to New Zealand:
100% Pure New Zealand!
Our curriculum included fields such as anthropology, geology, ecology, and geography, and most of our learning reflected those fields. From May 12th to May 15th we took classes in Christchurch, then we split up into two 36 student groups and set out to see how "100% Pure" New Zealand really was.
(The yellow homes are places we stayed, the trees are parks we went to, and the two buildings with flags are places we had a lot of class (you could say those places were really class-y))
Picture of Christchurch
Where all the boring-ness happened (aka classes) (#P)
We went to the Antarctic center and got to see these guys! (#P)
Me and some amigo's at the Antarctic Center (the #P pics are Peter's) (#P)
May 16&17 - Stayed at Glentanner to check out Mt. Cook
Our first stop (this is Glentanner)
Mt. Cook Nature Hike (Mt. Cook is the highest peak in New Zealand)
Mt. Cook is the Peak behind us
May 18&19, Trip to Te Anau to check out Milford Sound
Great view on some mountains on our way from Mt. Cook to Milford
Only time when we got our own room! (#P)
Milford Sound, absolutely incredible!
More Milford
And more Milford!
May 20-22 Queenstown (Aka the best city on Earth)
Saw this bad boy on our way to Queenstown. I ate it and grew 5 feet and could shoot fireballs! (I didn't really eat it)
Free day in Queenstown, went on a LOTR tour!
Hanging out at our hotel!
Picture of our guide (guy in front) and friends before hitting the town
Stopped by Haast Village on our way up to Fox Glacier (May 22-23)
This is probably one of the greatest pics I've ever taken...
Awesome reflecting lake!
Emily laughs in the face of danger
Ever wondered where I got my old background pictures? They were at Fox Glacier!
Signature pic #1
Signature Pic #2
Signature Pic #3!
Group Pic!
Another fav of mine!
RED SUNSET! SO GOOD! (And this still doesn't come close to doing it justice) (#P)
My attempt (Last one was Peter's)
May 24th, checking out Hokitika's Beach
Everyone had animal names except me. I was the 'Zookeeper'
Incredible Sunset
May 25, Punakaiki for Pancake Rocks
It was really hard to get a picture of the rocks, Peter did a good job though (#P)
May 26, Arnaud Day Hike
Arnaud Mountains
Another View (props to Emily for this one girl in the blue in the pic below)
The Crew that hiked
May 28 - Abel Tasman Park
Passed this gem on our way there
And kayaking!
May 29 - Akaroa Boat Tour
(If it had been a nice day we would have got to swim with the dolphins, but this wasn't half bad!)
Sooo, not the greatest quality, but this was my profile pic for a LONG time, and I love this picture. Photo Cred to Kayla (third to the left in the pic below)
Huge trees!
ANDDDD, I don't know what on Earth happened on May 31st, hahahah.
BUT on June 1st we went biking!
I seem to know this guy...
The super awesome bikers!
June 2nd, Beach fun! (And not like Hokitika with sand flies, this time it was nice)
Indiana Peyser
Looking out at the Ocean
Frisbee fun!
June 3rd included lots of boring class, I'll spare you the details.
AND JUNE 4th, last day!
Final meal at an awesome restaurant!
And then we flew home!
Also, I see these grand adventures as Works-in-Progress. I'm going to try to figure out what happened on May 31st and keep an eye out for pics/videos to make this post better.
Also, there supposedly is some way to embed a playlist into these posts, and I would love to put a little playlist to this post for your viewing pleasure, if I can figure it out.
(And I'm going to put the date of this trip as June 5th 2009 in a few weeks iA, but I want to keep the date recent so people can see this now.)
Wow!! thats a great adventurous trip there.
ReplyDeleteThere is lot to plan before you leave for the country where you going to study.
Study Abroad in US