The Quickest Month Ever

Today is August 8th. I have been in New Zealand for over a month. This is crazy. We just booked most of the hostels for our south island trip. One of them even includes a sauna, free breakfast and free dinner. I'm pretty excited! We still have heaps of adventures before then though. Friday I leave to go skiing for the weekend at Whakapapa. It's about a four hour drive and is the first of many weekend trips.

This past weekend I went to an indoor climbing place with Lauren and Megan. We had discounts so it only cost $8. I had a lot of fun and was exhausted at the end of our hour.
Me at the top of a climbing station.

Lauren nearing the top.
We also went out to a club for a different Megan's birthday. We ended up staying out until 4:30 and I had to get up at 6:45 the next morning but it was worth it. Clubs don't have closing times here so people tend to get there after midnight and can stay as late as 6AM. I consider myself a night owl but this is a little excessive.

The early wake up was ok since I was off to plant trees on Motutapu Island with IFSA-Butler. This is one time where I really missed the SMC community. Some of the other people in my program were asking why we were here and were shocked that other people showed up to help out. People at SMC are generally much more welcoming to community service. It made me miss all my friends from the Texas extended service trip. We got up early every morning that week to plant trees and help out and there was never any complaining.

Most of the planting crew
By the end everyone was having a good time and it was a great day. One of the great things about IFSA-Butler events is that we always have so much food. I didn't even have to make dinner that night thanks to the heaps of food that were brought along!

Today Megan, Caroline and I went into Devonport to explore. There were not a whole ton of shops so we ended up taking the ferry into Auckland. We ended up finding a burrito place which made my day. It had been over a month since my last burrito and I was going through some serious withdrawals. In all honesty it wasn't that good compared to Moe's or Boloco but it was still great!

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