Okay, I know I haven’t been keeping you guys as up to date as I should.

When I got back to Auckland, I went to the zoo. I met a kiwi! They have a really cool giraffe pavilion where you can walk around the pen at a level about the height of the giraffe’s head. We also got to feed them carrots and celery! Then we got taken around by one of the zoo volunteers, who told us about the kiwi breeding programs and interesting facts like if a dog finds a kiwi and eats it, it will hunt kiwi with a passion afterwards; they’re like some kind of canine delicacy or something and since kiwi’s natural defences are against birds of prey, they don’t hide from dogs very well. It’s one of the main reasons that they’re so close to extinction. The same can be said of much of New Zealand’s native fauna as large predators and even large mammals are not really native here.

I’ve also been to MoTaT which stands for museum of transportation and technology. I got to see the pump house where they used to pump water from the lake resevoir all over New Zealand. They also had an exhibit on the antarctic expedition from New Zealand, which was really cool, and they had a bunch of trains and planes that reminded me of Opa. I learned about New Zealand during WWII and it sounds much the same as Canada.

We went on a tiny railway meant to service the workers at one of the dams around Auckland. The railway still services the dam and runs right beside the mail waterway, but mostly now it’s a tourist attraction. The train was tiny and cramped and took us through tight tunnels and over skinny bridges, but it was quite the view. I’ll post pictures for you soon. The dam itself was quite beautiful too; unfortunately the pictures don’t give the sense of scale that I was hoping they would. On the train ride back, we saw glow worms in the tunnels.

Later on I went into Auckland town to do a walking tour that was in my guide book. I walked around the town and checked out some of the sites that were listed. The waterfront is beautiful and the university is quite nice too. I dropped off a couple resumes and gathered the names of some professors while I was out, but this is their vacation season so I haven’t gotten any responses yet.
After that, I hopped on a ferry to Devonport where I explored a dormant volcano that had been turned into a defense outpost and wanderede along the beach.

Christmas was a couple days ago now and it was very strange. On one hand, we had a gorgeous time sitting in the kiddie pool in 25 degree heat, sipping sangria and blowing bubbles. On the other hand, it felt like summer vacation at the cottage; certainly not Christmas. C and R got me a voucher for horseback riding though, so now I have to find a place to go *is excited*

Yesterday, boxing day, we did a little shopping and then headed out to the beach where we proceeded to swim in the ocean for a couple hours, grab some fries and then head further up the coast for a walk through some tidal pools, with star fish, chiton, anemones and hermit crabs (I didn’t pick one up for you Dad, sorry)

The summer vacation vibe has not been helping me get stuff done here, but I still have a couple of tentative job leads and there are a couple of agencies keeping their eyes open for me. I will go back to planning on Tuesday, when everyone goes back to work.

Goodbye from Auckland for now. I’ll try to be in touch sooner in the future. I hope you’re all well and had a merry Christmas.

Originally published at Teri's NZ Adventures.
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