Sadly, I’m at the end of my vacation but I’m looking forward to getting back to the island. New Zealand was more beautiful than I ever imagined. With the help of my high school friend Matt Bruno, I was able to see the whole South Island in two weeks. Matt has been working on a dairy farm outside Oamaru for the past 9 months, so he was a great tour guide. I also traveled with two other girls from Peace Corps Vanuatu (Teresa and Amy). I commend Matt for his efforts of putting up with three girls for two weeks; luckily he brought a book and has the patience of a saint.

I’ll just give a quick list of what we saw.
We began in Christchurch and then took a detour to see Mt. Cook and Lake Tekapo, both spectacular. We stayed on Matt’s farm in Georgetown for a night, which was very peaceful. Then we drove down and stayed in Dunedin for a night, my favorite sight there was the train station, oh and we also climbed the world’s steepest street, not too impossible.We drove out to Te Anau and took a boat out through Milford Sounds and by good fortune saw a pod of dolphins as well as sea lions. We also took a tour of the glow worm caves, which we’re okay. They just look like a bunch of tiny stars, not too exciting.
We then drove out to Queenstown, which was my one of my favorite towns. Tons of tourists, but it was the town with the most things to do and the only town with decent night life. I conquered my deathly fear of heights by jumping off a cliff attached to a parachute otherwise known as paragliding. The scariest part was running of the cliff. All I could think of as I was running was, “what if I end up tripping?” For all of you who know me, you know that unless I’m dancing, I’m one of the clumsiest people ever. I just kept envisioning myself tripping, the guide running/tripping over me and then getting dragged down the cliff on my face. Luckily, none of this happened. It was a smooth flying experience and lasted about 10 minutes. After Queenstown, we drove up to the glaciers. We were running out of money so we didn’t take the glacier walk, but we were able to get some nice photos. We then drove up along the west coast, which was interesting because of how topographically different it was from the east; much more rainy and greener. We stayed in Nelson for a couple nights which was my other favorite town, very artsy! We took an afternoon and toured seven wineries and were feeling pretty good after the seventh and had acquired several bottles of wine in the process. We then made our way down to Kaikora and saw several seal lions colonies and finally finished again in Christchurch. We caught the beginning of the Busker’s festival, a festival with all sorts of wacky street performances.
It was a fabulous vacation. It was a very safe and easy place to travel in, ideal for backpackers and hitchhikers. I wish I could do it all over again...someday.

It was nice to see everyone while I was home. Keep writing me and giving me updates about what’s going on at home. I’ll do my best to keep everyone updated as well. I’ll be going back to Gaua in about a week. Unfortunately, last week Gaua was slightly scarred be a cyclone. Many of their gardens, houses and some buildings as the school were damaged. Fortunately, no one was injured and hopefully we won’t get anymore, but we still have several more months of cyclone season so we’ll see.

Thank you for everyone who has been sending me letters and packages. I just started a wish list on Amazon so people have a good idea of what I like to read.