Murchison

Murchison our new home until our parents get here!
Population: around 700
2 bars in town

We are living at a backpackers with a guy named John, and his dog King. There are 3 other people that live there who I work with. I work at the Commercial Hotel and Teegan just got a job at Riverview(I think) cafe. Yay! Teegan found a job instantly. She is also woofing at the backpackers. She only needs to work one hour a day to pay rent. Anymore time she puts in he is paying her. Sweet as! The town is pretty calm and quiet, but it has tons of people coming in and out all the time. It is in a valley surrounded by mountains and rivers. So there is tons of kayaking and rafting for tourists.

We have done nothing in town because we work and it has been raining for days. We have been having a Tom Hanks marathon at the backpackers with everyone that lives there. One night Teegan went fishing with our friend Joel but no luck. Yesterday we had some wine with dinner and then explored the river.

Wellington to Motueka

We caught the boat to the South Island and stayed in Picton for a night. We were contemplating camping but ended up staying in a hostel. Definitely don't regret that decision!! The hostel was cute and had a hot tub which we enjoyed very much. Next day we couldn't catch a bus because they were full so we hitchhiked to Motueka.

We'd been camping in Motueka looking for jobs with little luck, except for Jake. He got a job as a cook for a cafe. We met up with some old friends we had met backpacking in Tongariro. On the way to the beach with them we stopped to pick up some beer, and Tess got a phone call for a job! Ending the day lazing about on the beach drinking a couple beers with friends, perfect!

Tess and I plan to stay in Motueka another couple nights, and hopefully meet up with two friends from the beginning of the trip. After that we're heading to the tiny tiny town where Tess is going to be working for the next 6 weeks, Murchison. We don't know much except its the "white water capital of New Zealand." We are VERY excited and hopeful. I better find a job there, but if not I'll have a lot of time to burn. I bought running shoes today at the Salvation Army for $3 in preparation.

Wellington

Tess and I headed to Wellington and met up with Tess's friend Jake right away. We had never couch surfed before, but luckily we found an awesome place right away. We showed up and were greeted warmly by about 7 people, and we all played mafia. Later that night they went dumpster diving and got a huge score (chocolate, beer and pumpkin!).

Highlights of Wellington: BEST mochaccino we have ever had and probably ever will have in our lives. Hitting the bars, staying up WAY too late playing pool. Te Papa, wonderful museum. The "Christmas Tree" which was basically lights in the shape of a tree and created a beautiful light show every night. Under the tree there were giant comfy beanbags tempting us all to fall asleep to the light show above. An excellent potluck with the couch surfing employees we met complete with a real egg hunt. Visit to the the zoo, and ROLLERDERBY!

Palmy!

We pretty much abandoned the theme of naming posts after the date because as you've noticed, we can slack sometimes.

So we were promised "a wicked time" and we definitely got that. Over the weekend we got to see what life is like at a kiwi batch (beach house). We had to pick up a crate of Tui for crate day, then made a stop at the Tui brewery for pics. We found ourselves on the longest driveway EVER on this windy dirt road and stopped off at "Gorgeous" George's house in the wop-wops (middle of nowhere). They had all these chickens with their chicks roaming around the yard with the dogs.

We drove back out to head to the batch. Together there were 16 people there, family and friends (10 were under 26 years old). We made a giant tee-pee that we unfortunately couldn't set on fire.. watched them ride dirt bikes on the beach, and drank crates all night. Tess sat by the bonfire for a bit while I played spoons with the rest of the family (I have the scars to show for it!). I chose to sleep inside, Tess slept in the yard to watch the stars (and saw over 10 shooting stars).

Next day Brad ditched us and left us with his friends and relatives to go dirt biking. We went jet skiing! Tess went on her own but I chose to get a ride from George. He gave me a sweet ride!!

We all got in wet suits to collect some food in the low tide, but only found Paua and one Kina. The road to get there was pretty borderline.. it wasn't even a road really. We pretty much thought we were going to die. For reals. Anyone that knows anything about me knows that it was probably the scariest moment of my life. A few braved the Kina tasting (including tess). They cracked open the spiky ball with a knife and the inside was just a mess of unidentifiable yellow and black goo, the yellow parts were edible (supposedly). Tess said she wouldn't eat it again.

On the way back we went into the wop-wops again, ie. George's house. We saw some smoke on the hillside downwind of their house and asked.. "Is that ok.. over there?"
After eating a bit we looked back and there was a LOT more smoke and we saw some flames in the nearby brush. We asked if we should call the fire department, and the reply we got was something like "It's supposed to rain tomorrow." Apparently it's the 4th brush fire they have had. The flames at one point were at least 25ft tall.

We went back to Brad's for bbq and homebrew. The Paua was tasty to eat but was reeeally chewy. Next stop for us: Couch surfing in Wellington!

Be excellent to each other

National Park to Palmerston North

why hello MOUNT DOOM

Ok time to stop slacking!! After our wwoofing experience we took a bus to National Park (the town) and stayed at a backpackers readying ourselves for our backpacking trip: the Northern Circuit loop, a 3-day 2-night trip. The trip was AMAZING, I've never hiked so much in my life. The terrain was everything.. hills, mountain, valleys, sand, plains, forest, emerald pools.. The highlights were definitely the homebrew bourbon we were offered by some of the employees at a hut, and all the cool people we met.



After the trip, we travelled with Yotam, an Israeli guy we met at one of the huts. It was pretty nice being able to use his car for a while!! Just pile our stuff in the front, and the back was this huge comfy mattress. The next few days we were pretty lazy. We pretty much just drove around up the East coast stopping wherever we wanted, taking a swim, napping on the beach, going on a few hikes.. more napping on the beach.. Most towns were pretty dead at night but in Taupo we found some bars and danced to live music. Going into Taupo there were hundreds of bikers, it was like every kiwi got on their bike at the same time. They were all doing 160 kilometers (100 miles) and ending in Taupo where they were having this sweet BMX event.

We parted ways with Yotam in Rotorua and took a 5hr bus ride to Palmerston North to meet up with another guy, Brad, we had met in the bush. He was one of the employees who built one of the huts there. We hung out at his place last night (yay laundry and showers!) and tonight we're going to a beach party with a bunch of kiwis. Half the time we can't understand a word they say even though they're speaking English. Here's an example: Hay Mate
just got out of the bush and now its time to bbq at the batch for tea kiwi style. k? It will be a mean/wikid time.
Tea = dinner, batch = beach house (what??)
Sidenote: Apparently we came here on crate day. One day a year they sell giant bottles of beer that you buy in crates. Lucky us ay?

We wanted to add, in New Zealand its not the 6 degrees of separation, its the 2 degrees of separation. Already we've met a ton of backpackers that know people we've run into. Sooo many awesome people here!

Happy Crate Day!

Sitting at a youth hostel in Grisborne drinking red wine and cooking. Tonight we celebrated Haunaka with an Israeli guy we are traveling with!
We are way behind! For a week we were in Tongariro National Park hiking. We did a 3 day backpacking trip which was AMAZING!