And zack, I am in New Zealand! But let’s start from where I last finished. We arrived in Sydney on Thursday (don’t ask me which date) and had a great welcome from Vicky again. Enjoyed her “facilities” and a big bed!Well, Humphrey had to be cleaned and sorted, we needed to sort all the little things that we had collected on the trip and that took a while! wehn humphrey was presentable again we drove to Richard’s house and managed to be stopped by the police on our very last ride in Humphrey-we simply look a bit too hippie like in that car I guess. We sold Humphrey back to Richard quite quickly and found ourselves back on the street “homeless” without him )-:
On Saturday we chilled a bit and then went to Victoria’s first gig which ended in a drunk night with not many memories (-:
Inga left on Sunday and went back to Melbourne-so there I was, on my own all of a sudden. I had a quiet Sunday weekend with Victoria and Travis and then started sorting out my bits and pieces during the next days:
I closed my account, tried to sell some books, tried to unlock my mobile for New Zealand, booked accommodation for NZ and so on. Inbetween that I chilled out at the harbour of Sydney and had a great day watching the street musicians: one day 3 kids ended up danicing at the harbour and the guitar player then changed his repertoire to childrens’ songs like “old McDonald” that lead to all passing people joining into making loud animal sounds!
Another day an old couple (78 and 80 years old as I found out later) were dancin Tango at the harbour-and they were really good!I wonder if they knew how many people smiled because of them dancing that day!!!
It is just fabulous to watch people on the street! well, after those few days my 2 boys, dave and julian, arrived from melbourne and we had a great weekend: diners, drinks in the evening. We went for the harbour bridge climb on saturday which was brilliant! You climb around that bridge in full gear to the very top while a guide explains the history and construction of the bridge. 3 hours and 1600 steps later we were back on the ground after we enjoyed some fab views from the top of the bridge!
On Sunday we took the ferry to Manly beach and chilled out until the boys had to leave to the airport again )-: If we will ever see each other again-who knows?!?! That is a weird though actually, but I still hope that the invention of “beaming” transport is not too far away (-;
The next day i flew to the Ayers rock or Uluru and spent 3 days wonderin around the rock-had a great time: went for a guided tour to the rock, saw it at sunrise (great colours!) and did quite a lot of walking: 10 km around the base, 2km on the mala walk where a ranger gave us some interesting facts about the rock, the next day I walked another 8km in the Olgas which is another formation of rocks close by. the colours of Ayers rock at sunrise and sunset are something that you have to see-a photo just doesn’t show it!
I am gald I went for it although it was veeery expensive! obviously you don’t have much choice in the middle of nowhere and they know it. I even went for an aboriginal dot painting workshop and I am finally able to see what the pictures express-that was excellent (and expensive (-;).
I came back last Thursday, had a goodbye-diner with Vicky and Travis and then packed my stuff again. Goodbye from Victoria on Friday morning (at least I will see her in a few months when she is in Europe) and then off I went to New Zealand-I managed to bring all my stuff but still not have more than 20kg in my chegged baggage (-;
So, here I am, in a hostel in Auckland. So far, I am just overwhelmed by so much information and people-the hostel is very crowded and I find that a bit stressful to be in a kitchen with 20 others trying to quietly have my diner.So, I decided to move to a calmer area tomorrow-puh, looking forward to it. There is many things to do here, NZ is a country of extreme sports-which is great, but also means that you spend hundreds of dollars for a short lasting adrenaline kick.john is coming in a weeks time and as we want to see most things together I will just chill out and explore Auckland. We will then rent a campervan and explore the North Island together. I went for a daytrip to Waiheke island with Denise and Kevin from the hostel which was a nice day out. I will go on a day tour in auckland tomorrow and there is a few mountains and museums I will explore within the next days.In the hostel here is a sauna and a spa-so I ended up sitting in a hot spa on the rooftop last night overlooking Auckland at night and just thought: life is sooo good!!Other than that I just walked around the town and got some information together what to do. Being on my own is o.k so far, I thought it would be worse, but you get in contact with others easily-at least there is enough people around me! But even outside of the hostel, I ended up chatting to a fireman at starbucks which was quite nice and interesting. It is actually hard to find some quiet time on my own as in the room there is always people coming and going, chatting, light on, light off and so on-have to get used to that. The weather has been good so far, sunny and warm (not hot). it is also weird to be without a car as now I have to think twice before I go food shopping and then end up carrying the heavy shopping bags around town!(-;
So much from New Zealand so far-more to come soon
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