HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF BLOOD PRINCE!

Just thought I'd let you know I was going tonight...because I know you're just as excited as I am!

And I can assure you Caleb is over the moon about getting to come with me to this life changing event...he might even dress up...

Ok ok fine I'm kidding there will be no dressing up, and Caleb may not be as excited as I am, but I'm still sitting on the edge of my seat! And I know deep down somewhere in his brain he's as excited as I am

Ok so i'm a bad blogger

Hi all,
I know, I know, I havent written in a long time. So much has happened though! I will put up some photos for you to see a snapshot of whats going on!

This is Marilee and I...of course!

Caleb and I being goofy one night

Out with Caleb and some of his friends

This is Caleb's brither Josh and sister Tahlya

A beautiful skyline of Auckland, I love this city!

I was trying to take a photo of Rangitoto...it's hiding behind us

Minus the laundry in this photo, this is the best apartment in the world!

With the best kitchen in the world! (Other than my kitchen on Elm st...obviously mom!)

Just an update

So I thought Iwould write and update you all on what's going on in Auckland, because I havent really done so in a while!
My job is going really well and everyone I work with is really nice. I'm working mostly three days a week unless they need me to work more. It's really nice to be working again after my extended holiday. Holiday's are nice but sometimes I miss working!
I fell down the stairs a while back...I know I'm a super big clutz... and I bruised my tailbone. I think I might have cracked it because it's still hurting when I sit down, or walk up hills. But it's not a big inconvenience or anything and will heal itself up in a couple weeks.
Oops i've got to run! But i'll write more soon and put up more photos!

Starting my new job tomorrow

I got a job! Finally! My first day is tomorrow and i'm pretty excited. Being the backpacker I am I budgeted the clothing that I could fit into my backpack by squeezing in as much as possible. Unfortinutally I had to pack for all sorts of weather and situations, and this limited the amount of 'work clothes' I could bring. But I think i'll manage for a little while, though I miss my green shoes!
Ok enough about clothing, here's a little info on my job.
It's an administration position at an IT company. No, stop laughing, I know I dont have the best track record with computers, or technology in general, but I'm doing admin, not the actual IT work. And it should be fun! Maybe I'll learn a little bit more about computers and how to use them without having to call IT to help me. And if I do run into trouble, everyone there is IT so someone's bound to help me! So i'm going to be working three days a week, at the start it will be Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and its for about 5 hours a day. I'm writting reports to customers letting them know whats going on.

But I should get to bed, I need to get a good nights sleep before my first day at a new job! I hope its lots of fun, and if not I'll just make it fun!

Photos: Auckland, Rangitoto, Tongariro!

Here are some photos of my first few weeks in New Zealand!

MARILEES 21ST BIRTHDAY!

Lany (Mar's little sister), myself, Marilee, and Robin (another friend visiting from Winnipeg)

Some of the decorations! A 21st birthday is a big one that people celebrate in New Zealand, even though the legal age is 18. So a lot of the time the birthday person rents out a bar and invites all their friends! Which is just what Marilee did! So we decorated it up a little and got all dressed up and had a great time!

Day Trip: Rangitoto

Mar and Robin and I did a day trip to a dormant volcano island called Rangitoto, which was amazing!

There were lava caves to explore...dont worry it was old lava, not new stuff...

Inside the caves! My head lamp came in very handy, and looked very stylish

Easter-Long Weekend

Ohhh it was so cold!

13 more to go!!!! It was just under 20 km in total!

Mount Ngarahoe (AKA Mount Doom from the Lord of the Rings)

Emerald Lakes (or one of them atleast)

Mar and I

We just finished climbing that!

Gordon, Marilee and I!

Can you believe it! we ran into our gym teacher from high school!

The next day a bunch of us went kyacking!

We adventured under into a bridge, and they were channelling water so we first went under the bridge and then portaged across to this stream and then went into the bridge, and then had a race...of course

Easter Long and the week leading up to it

Easter long weekend was amazing! But i'll get to that in a minute.

This past week Marilee took Tuesday off so we could climb Rangitoto (i cant spell or pronounce anything here) which is a dormant volcanic island just off the coast of Auckland. It was amazing and so much fun even though we had spent the night before dancing and were a little tired. This island was so lush and green and just beautiful and we had a perfectly clear day so we could see the harbor and downtown. I'll put up pictures later but they don't do it justice. If anyone is ever coming to Auckland, Rangitoto would be my first recommendation.

Alright so that was a highlight of that week which leads up to this past weekend, where instead of climbing a dormant volcano I climbed an active volcano! Because this was a 4 day weekennd a bunch of Marilee and Gordon's work mates decided to rent a couple baches...bach's... I don't know the plural..basically it's a cabin..outside the city maybe 4 or 5 hours drive. So there was 12 of us total and we had two baches and 4 days! We got there on the friday and just hung out all evening and relaxed and had a few beers. The second day we (well most of us) got up early and took a bus to the Tongariro (once again I'm unsure of the spelling) Crossing and prcceeded to climb for a long long time. It was 20 km long and fantastic the whole way! And no, if anyone's wondering I didnt see any fresh lava. I'll put up pictures for you later so you can better understand what it was like but it was definitly worth it...even though a lot of it smelt like sulfur. Oh and also for you Lord of the Rings fans that may be reading this...I was climbing up beside Mount Doom, which was pretty neat...even though i'm not a huge fan myself. Ok so that was saturday. Sunday was just as beautiful so we decided to work a different set of muscles and go kyacking for the afternoon. That was awfully eventful and filled with a lot of waterfights and people falling into the water and it even involved an adventure upstream into a bridges waterchannel. Then today we woke up and packed and tidied up and drove home, sadly, back to real life and into the beginnings of my hunt for a job!

chicken transportation in the Himalayas

more from mommah

Ever the dancing queen, there is a full 3 minute video now on your tube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCByCfP34nc of Alicia dancing Nepali-style in the kitchen with our assistant leader Boje .... all the while the cook and Pierre kept making the meal over an open fire while the dance craze raged on!

not exactly in order here .... but we are at the world famous climber's bar that everyone has gone to for years .... you get to hang up a foot fore each expedition and this was ours ....

When Pierre decides to ride on the top of the bus he can't resist hanging over the side to catch a splendid photo of Alicia hanging out the window.

.... so Alicia decides to go swimming but forgets that she has on her money-belt .... so here's my girl drying out "another" wet passport, cash, ID and other precious goodies!

photos from Mommah

This is Alicia getting a Tikka from a local store keeper. Check out that stone pathway .... you have to really watch your step or you will end up doing a donkey dance!

We happened to be in remote village during the festival of "Holi" when everyone gets colours thrown at them and everyone offers to give you a Tikka at least, or a full face of red powder if you are not careful .... Alicia was just starting to get really sick at this point but wore her Tikka with style! She also played with every puppy we came across!

Mom and Alicia get reunited after 5 days apart ... horay!

More Nepal Pictures!

More Pictures!

Ok so when I got sick our guide Tirtha couldn't leave me alone to be sick AND find my way the other way around the Annapurna circuit to meet up with the group on the other side of Throng-La pass, so he let one of the porters to stay with me and be my guide. This is Raz, he was my porter and guide when I got sick. He made sure I ate food and drank lots of water and tea so that I would get better. He also helped me get a lot of taxi's, jeeps and buses over the period of about 5 days so that we could be reunited with our group. I took more than two days to recover and by that time the group was too far ahead and I wouldnt have been able to catch up (there were no roads that far in so I couldnt catch a jeep to meet up with them) so I had to backtrack and drive up the part of the circuit we would be finishing on. Wow that was a long one. So anyways, this is Raz and I with one of the many jeeps we had to take, the Chicken Jeep to be exact, but that story is for another entry.




With the group again! Well this is part of the group at least. We met in a town called Muktinath, which is actually a famous sight for those of you who have some knowledge of world religions. This town contains a holy pilgrimage sight for both Hindu's and Buddhistsm the erternal flame and the 108 water spouts. Look it up, its actually really interesting.

Two of our porters being silly!




Thats me and the Himalayas, they're even bigger than Spring Hill!

This is my new boyfriend, it was the nost ring that got me.

The woman in the area all loom and its so beautiful, so I bought a bunch, and asked if it was alright if I took a picture with her so I can remember who made them

Do I really need to explain the excitement of this photo?! And no it's not that fact that they have internet...and therefore electricity...


Whoever can tell me the total and comlete excitement of this photo will get a prize. And no, no one from the hike that may be reading this is allowed to guess because they were there and witnessed my excitement. Hint: there are more than one.

Awesome...I like stuff...

Pierre my Mom and I (oh, and Chloe's hat!) taking a break!

Here's some more of the group!

This day started off as a blur and ended as a blur. It was approximatly 9 hours up-hill. This is what we climbed in the first quarter of the day. It took approximatly two hours...because we had to go up a switchback of stairs...stone ones that had been hand-cut and laid...

For example see above...and below

This was one of that hardest days for me, but it was totaly worth it and even enjoyable. If you know the saying "What goes up, must come down", you'll know that this usually applies to everything...including hills/mountains/going up stairs...that kind of thing. So yes, one day we went up, the next day we went down. The down was a little more terrifying at some places because it was a staircase cut into what is as close to a cliff as you can get without it being a cliff. So another few hours of a handcut staircase switchback was the next days adventure. But I didnt get a picture of that. The morning of that downhill day actually started with a 4:30 wake up call to climb another hill and watch the sunrise...as if we werent at a high enough altitude already.

And so a bunch of us got up to climb Poon Hill. This being an optional sidetrip a few people decided to sleep in. Me not being the most morning of people decided to do it anyways and sacrifice my sleep, how could I not after being sick and missing part of the trek. So this is Tyler and I infront of the sign, just to prove we had done it...oh yeah and there was snow...

And here is the crew that decided to climb, and the mountains in the background of course.

Tirtha and his new wives

I dont know if you'll believe me but it's true. On the same day we climbed Pool Hill and walked down the switchback cliff stairs, we also walked through a rainforest with moss everywhere and a beautiful river, and it was really hot!

A photo that came much to soon, the end of our trip!

So I have some stories to share with everyone but that just took a lot of time! So I will share them soon! I hope you enjoyed those! There may even be more to come because my mom had a camera as well so there might be some of hers coming up on here as well!