I LOVE NEW ZEALAND!

So I'm finally here, after a SUPER long time of travel, get to NZ in Auckland, two hour wait, fly to Christchurch and then a two hour drive here to Kaikoura. When I saw it here all I thought was THIS IS A JOKE!! It is so beautiful. There is a pebble stone beach with aquamarine water along the peninsula and GORGEOUS white capped mountains along it, which are the Southern Alps. In between the two is where I live! We are staying in a beeeeeeeautiful house which was previously a convent, which is why they call it The Old Convent. In 1988 the nuns moved out and it became a B&B and then yesterday turned into CCSP's new place to stay! Lovely. I so hard core love it. I woke up this morning looking out in the beautiful town, and then took a brisk walk through the foggy fields filled with sheep- there are SOOOOOOOOOOOO many sheep here, for real. Oh and it is absolutely freezing. I have on 4 layers right now and I'm still cold. I clearly didn't know what to bring so I'm gonna get some wool socks and maybe something else real soon. I found that wearing 3 pairs of cotton socks barely does anything. They gave us all down comforters though so it's ok, I was super warm last night. The house is AMAZING. It's huge, with tons of bathrooms, atleast 8 or 9, probably more, which is perfect when sharing a house with 19 girls and 4 boys. It rains all the time here. I guess it normally doesn't rain this much here and that it's record setting. OH and guesssss what--- I started screaming in the car yesterday because I saw the most beautiful clean blue double cab splitty bus driving down the street. Didn't have time to bust out my camera though. I said it was my goal in the next 4 months to find it and take a pic. I RAN INTO IT TODAY!!! So took a pic but now I'm in an internet cafe in town so i can't put the pic on here yet. It reminded me of home. I won't be able to go on the internet that much till monday, if at all, because our house isn't hooked up yet, and when it is, we are limited. But I will try my best to keep this updated. For now, I LOVE NZ, even with its extreme freezingness. :) Till next time.... Whakawateatia he wa hai hurihuri i nga mea whai tikanga

Today is the Day!!

Ok so I'm very super very excited because I leave for New Zealand today! It literally took me 4 tries of packing and repacking in order to fit into the wacky Kiwi flight luggage dimensions. Plus we have to bring the world- internal frame backpack, snorkeling gear, fleece (!), sleeping bag, it said optional stove and in the end I was like WHO HAS ROOM FOR A STOVE!!! But in the end everything I'm bringing fits [praise the Lord] and I can relax. I leave for LAX tomorrow evening and then meet up with everyone there. So excited!!! It's so weird that I'm going to the other side of the world tomorrow. To winter! It's crazy because we had to pack basically every seasonal option for clothing since we are going to be backpacking in wintery conditions in New Zealand as well as snorkeling in tropical waters in Samoa. I go all na-tur-al for 4 months, starting tomorrow. But don't worry, I'll be wearing clothes. There is much adventure to come. I am excited. It's gonna take basically FOREVER to get there though. Travel is fun though.

Anyways, I think I'll have internet access there but I don't know how often or how strong it is, so we'll see. I'm tired. Time for bed!!! Hasta luego.