Devonport

Short post: I went to Devonport yesterday. It's only a 12minute ferry ride, but I haven't been there for some reason. It was a really nice day, and I walked around the shops. A man was playing a harp on the street, very nice. There are two extinct volcanoes in the area, North Head and Mount Victoria. North Head was really cool, there were tunnels dug into the sides of the hill, remnants of a never-used military fortification. Anyways, here are some pictures I took. All my pictures are at here at

http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/dustinrcollins

Harbo(u)r

Busy busy, two weeks left. Classes are coming to an end here, and I've got a few things to do. We deliver our program we've been working on all semester to the client on Thursday, and I think all will go well. I'm in charge of quality assurance and testing, and have learned a bit of PHP in the past couple weeks so I feel pretty good about my progress in Software Engineering. Otherwise, my only other project is a group presentation about Maori and Norse creation stories for Intro to Culture and Society. My roommates are Randi, a Dane, and Jaime, a Canadian. It should turn out well, even though I have the feeling Randi and I will be shouldering most of the load.

Speaking of Randi, I had my first modeling shoot this past Friday. She is taking a photography paper, and needed an Adam for her portfolio. Well, the idea was to have two sets of photos, one of Eve biting the apple and one of Adam overcome with grief and anger. I sat in a chair in a photo studio with my shirt off and tried my hand at acting after Randi poured water on my face, faux tears. I'm excited to see how they turn out, I'll have some prints to take home with me.

I got a hold of my travel agent, and I'll be flying home June 16. Soon, I know. Too soon for me, but what can you do. It's strange leaving this place, our surrogate home, spending your last days with friends that you may never see again. I've gotten close to quite a few people, whether it's obvious or not. I will miss my friend Bianca the most, but now I have an excuse to hop the pond to Europe. To visit, to live? Who knows..

Here's what the clouds over the city looked like yesterday afternoon. My window is a little dirty.



I went to a standup show this earlier week, it was a really good time. There were four comics, each representing their style well. The audience was small, the crowd interaction made the show really fun. Kiwi humo(u)r seems to be a little behind American humor though, probably because of the sheer amount of comic output in the states.

Anyways, I took a walk to the west harbor today. I hadn't been there yet. Auckland is so massive, it's been an endeavor to see all the city has to offer. I'm sure trying though. I sneaked my way into one of the docks, following a man with a canoe through the locked gates. The yachts there are insane, nicer than a lot of apartments I've been in. I was bummed that I couldn't walk across the harbor bridge to Devonport, but I'm taking the ferry there tomorrow to do some bushwalking. Here are some pictures I took on the way to the harbor.

Plaid/Denim

Hey all, so much for writing more huh. I'd like to say it's because I've been overwhelmingly busy, the truth is I'm just now coming out of an ambition slump. Sometimes I have a hard time sitting down and focusing, usually about a month before the semester ends. My slump has been getting shorter every year though, so maybe by the time I graduate (December 2009 I'm pretty sure) I'll have the hang of things.

Anyways, Auckland... The weather is getting damp, usually around 60 every day and rain two or three times a week. Winter is coming, even if snow isn't. My classes are wrapping up, my last final is on June 18th. I'll be back in the states June 19th. My finals are spread out so I'll have some free time to see some new things. I'm heading down to Taupo with my friend Karla this weekend to go skydiving. Jumping 12,000 feet above the largest lake in New Zealand promises to be something I'll never forget, to say I'm excited would be an understatement.

I'm going to work on setting up a 2-3 day hike with my friend Kyle in the Northland in June. It's been a while since I've been outta the city. I haven't decided if I like the big city or not yet. It's nice to be able to walk to everything I need, but the scenery and atmosphere outside of Auckland has just been amazing.

I decided to take some pictures of my place, as you can see it's got the 'lived-in' feel to it by now.





Well I'm off to work on some whale-tracking software for class, I'll take a bunch of pictures in Taupo and get them up here soon. Take care everyone.

Warm Poison Rats

Hey everyone, I'm going to try to start blogging more often. I've been meaning to for a while, and Elliott said I should too so here goes. Auckland feels pretty comfortable to me now, at least the city center. It's taken a while to figure out that you should walk up Wakefield instead of Wellesley if you want to avoid most of the bums. I usually give someone money once a week, I figure it's my karmic repentance for what happens the rest of the week. Fall is hitting New Zealand, the leaves are falling here as people back home talk about things turning green again.

I've been a little depressed lately about issues, both here and back home. Foremost, my uncle Jesse has been diagnosed recently with an aggressive form of lymphoma. He is not even in his mid thirties yet, and he's terrified. I called him via Skype the day I found out, and it was great to talk to him but what can you say about a situation like that.. He knows it sucks, he doesn't need me to tell him that. Sometimes things are too massive to wrap your mind around. I've been thinking about him every day, and calling home to catch up on the latest news.

My brother got himself into a quagmire recently, racking up $24,000 in debt through some internet miscommunication. For the past year he'd been buying car parts from a website and somehow they never charged him. A couple weeks ago he got a letter in the mail: the jig was up. Now he has to take a year or so off of college to pay the company back. It seems sketchy to me they can hold him accountable when it was their payment system that screwed up. Sure, he knew what he was doing but I hope some one lost their job over that one. Nathan is talking about getting a CDL and doing some truck driving to pay back the money fast. I hope it works out for him, I can't help but think I will come home to this:



Speaking of coming home, I've decided to return to the states after a semester instead of a year. New Zealand is burning a hole in my wallet, and I've failed to find a way to patch it. Disappointing, but I know I'll be back some day, half a year isn't enough time to see this place. I'll be returning home in early July, and probably helping my dad out for the remainder of the summer. I'm missing my family and a few close friends more than I ever thought I would. I've met some amazing people here, and will be making the best of the time I have left with them.

I'll be heading back up to Cedar Falls for what I thought was my last year in August. I'm giving some serious thought to changing my minor though, my electrical engineering are a chore to go to, and I usually resort to drawing in my notebook mid-lecture. I'm going to look into graphic design or maybe some art minor; I really have no desire to become an engineer. Even if it takes a little longer and more money to graduate I think this is the right move for me, I can't see pursuing a career that doesn't allow me to be creative. I thought a dull job would be alright as long as I was able to pursue my hobbies after five, but I want to be happy for more than eight hours of my life a day.

I just packed up for my trip to the south island. I'll be gone for two weeks, burning petrol with Melissa, Christy, and Jaime. I am really excited, everyone I've talked to has gushed about how beautiful everything is there. We don't have much of a plan, but I prefer it that way. I can't think of anything I want to do more than tramping the Abel Tasman track for five days, nature is really making its way into my heart in this place. The clouds in my head lighten and disappear when I leave the city, the solitude and fresh air lift my spirits. A beard has crept back onto my face in the past few days, I feel that any serious adventurer should sport one. Besides, it could be cold down there.



I bought a tramping backpack off of a Chinaman in Manukau City, a suburb way down in south Auckland. Here it is next to my school pack, now known as babypak.



Goodbye for now Auckland.



I'll be out of touch for two weeks, but I'll be able to check my email if you want to get a hold of me. Leave me some comments. Until next time..

Easter Weekend

Hey everyone I hope you had a good Easter holiday. We had Friday through Tuesday off from school so it was a good time to get out of the city. Most people went north of Auckland to the beaches, but I decided to head east to the Coromandel Peninsula with my friend Karla, from Arizona. Before heading there though, we took the ferry to Waiheke Island in the harbour. It was a nice day, although we didn't see a lot of the island because we walked. We went to Palm Beach, and found out that Little Palm Beach was nude upon arrival. Here are some pictures from the day.



We rented a car on Sunday and headed east to Coromandel. Here was our route, in yellow.



We had a really good time learning to drive in New Zealand. The roads were mostly unpaved, sometimes one way, and all really windy. The speed limits were really high, I was going about half of the limit around some of the corners, especially when there was no barrier between the road and a cliff. We stayed at a very isolated backpacker's lodge Sunday night, and were able to talk the guy down from $80 a night to $25. We hiked in the forest Sunday, drove around the shore and went to a sweet water park on Monday, and traveled to Cathedral Cove on the east coast Monday before heading back to Auckland. Here are some pictures from the weekend.



I'm excited to head to my first rugby game tonight, in Eden Park. I'll try to get some things in the mail here soon. Take care everyone

Roadtrip/Semester begins

Hey everyone, I know it's been a while but I've been pretty busy these past few weeks. I am now in my second week of uni, classes started on March 3rd. This semester I'm taking Electrical Machines, Digital Electronics, Software Engineering, and Intro to NZ Society in Culture. The last one is a nice easy-going class, I'm looking forward to it. I've got classes Mon-Thurs, so I can travel on the weekends. But anyways, enough about boring class.

The week before classes started I joined in on a road-trip around the north island with Kyle and Jen, both from CA, Carolyn from the east coast of the US, and Heidi from Denmark. After renting a decent sized station wagon, the "Welly", we traveled south of Auckland, here is the route we took in blue.



Our first stop was Waitomo, home of the glowworm caves. Wanting something more interactive than just a boat ride through the caves, we signed up for a black-water rafting trip. The name was a little misleading, there was no rafting about the trip, but it was a lot of fun. We suited up in wetsuits and each received a large innertube to float on when the water got too deep. The water was cold, and the caves were pitch black but we had lights on our helmets. The glowworms were really beautiful suspended from the ceiling, we turned our lights out while we went under them. The tour ended with instructions to switch our headlamps off and find our way in the darkness to the exit, it was a great finish to the experience.



We then left the Waitomo region and headed for Rotorua to find a hostel for the night. We ended up at Hot Rock Hostel, not the best place in the world but it had a bar connected to it and free drink vouchers. Kyle didn't have the best of luck, he was plagued by loud drunk Englishmen and a couple having sex in the lower bed of his bunk.

The next day we headed south of Rotorua to the Waimangu Thermal Reserve. Much of the central north island sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire, so there is a lot of geothermal activity around places like Rotorua and Taupo. The reserve was really interesting with steaming rivers and bright colored ponds. We walked for about five hours along the walking and tramping paths there before we were picked up and returned to the entrance by bus in the afternoon. Rotorua has a Zorbing hill north of town so we drove up to check that out. It was too expensive for me, but I watched the other guys do it and they loved it, Kyle took a great video him inside during the roll. Here are some pictures, and a few videos, of Waimangu.



After Zorbing we traveled south from Rotorua and around the edge of Lake Taupo to Tongariro National Park. We stopped for a bit and took some pictures of the lake, it was enormous, the largest lake in the country. We ended up staying at a hostel inside the park, it was much nicer than the one in Rotorua and had a great restaurant just up the road.

We started Friday bright and early, catching a bus and arriving at the starting point of the Tongariro Alpine Crossing at 8am. The crossing is the most popular day walk in New Zealand, no doubt because it winds around "Mount Doom", or Mount Ngauruhoe, its real name. The tramp wasn't easy, the hardest I've been on so far, but it was worth it for the diverse landscapes and amazing views. After walking through grassy lowlands for a while, we came out on a lava plain before ascending the Devil's Staircase, a tough climb up about 2500 feet into the mountains. We ended up in the clouds for a good part of the walk, that was something I'd never experienced before, it was neat. We then started making our way down past the Emerald lakes, bright blue-green bodies of water filled with minerals from the eruptions. After descending down into the grassy hills again we ended up in a sub-tropical forest for the last hour of the tramp. It was a really great experience, and makes me even more eager to get out and see what kinds of tramping NZ can offer. Here are some pictures of the walk.



We stayed in the same hostel again that night, and the next day drove back up to Taupo to relax in the natural hot springs there. The girls got massages and facial treatments, it was a nice last day, we were all a little wore out from the tramp the day before. We left Taupo that afternoon and arrived back in Auckland that night.

Since then I've just been trying to get used to how things work in the city and around campus. I've been to the Wellesley Student Apartments a lot to have dinners with friends and also to the pubs around town. I did go to the Noho Marae this past weekend. It was basically a Maori welcome to international students at AUT. I learned a lot and it was nice to be welcomed into their whanau, their family. We learned songs, dances, and games and then performed them in front of a crowd on Saturday night before eating food from a hangi, an underground stone oven of sorts. They had pork, lamb, beef, potatoes, pumpkin... it was delicious.

I sent some gifts to some special ladies yesterday, I'm going to try to get something out to everyone here soon, it's just hard to find the time some days. I'll try to blog again before a few weeks pass. Take care everyone, I've been thinking about you.

Rotorua

Hello everyone. I've now officially made my way out of the shadows of Auckland City. On the 18th I took the NakedBus, a very low-cost long distance bus, down to Rotorua. NZ's first tourist town, it is about a 3 1/2 hour ride from Auckland, located in the center of the north island. I decided to check it out because of the geothermal activity, geysers, and natural hot springs in the area. I underestimated how much of a tourist town it was though, everything related to the hot springs was ridiculously expensive and catered towards the older tourist crowd. It reminded me a lot of Branson, MO, look they even have DUCKS!


Arriving around noon in town, I made my way to the hostel, the Funky Green Voyager, where I checked in and then looked for cheaper/free things to do. After some bus confusion, I made it out to Whakarewarewa Forest National Park southeast of town and hiked a path there for 5 hours or so. It was a tough beginning, rising 500m within the first hour, but the view over the city and Lake Rotorua was worth it. The park was called The Redwoods, but only a small portion of the park was redwoods, there were a lot of European trees mixed with the native foliage. It was a nice day, very relaxing.

I'm glad I took the bottom bunk at the hostel because the girl above me woke up with some kind of insect bites all over her face. She looked miserable, blotchy and red. I didn't use a hostel blanket, maybe that was the difference?

Anyways, the next day I walked to the north of town and the formal Government Gardens situated on the south shore of Lake Rotorua. They were pretty, in the center of them were several yards where aged people were playing lawn bowling and croquet. I sat and watched lawn bowling for a little while, and it just seemed like madness, I couldn't make sense of it. I walked around the lake and saw some neat sights, and some geothermal activity on the beach and across the lake. Tired of Rotorua, I caught the earlier bus back to Auckland and rested before I went to the pub with my friend Rachel from TN, whom I met at the hostel. We went to Shakespeare's Brewery downtown and tried some of their house brews. They were very delicious and strong, it was a long walk back to my apartment and I was out as soon as I hit the bed. Cheers all.

Rangitoto Island

Hey all, I had quite the adventure today. I made my way to Rangitoto Island, northeast of Auckland City in the harbour. It was a 25-minute ferry ride to the 600 year old volcano, the newest island in the area. You could definitely tell, much of the island was covered by large black igneous rocks, remnants of the relatively recent emergence of the island from the sea. The rest of the island was covered by native bush, including plants found only on Rangitoto. Motutapu, a much older island very close to Rangitoto to the east, was a sharp contrast to the black rock fields and forests of Rangitoto. Motutapu is mostly covered with short yellow grass, rolling hills with few trees. In the very blue water of the harbour it looked golden.

Most tourists that go to the island opt for the bus tour; the tramping trails are for those up for a challenge. The rough path and sharp inclines on the way to the summit, and along the coasts were definitely the hardest walk I've had so far in NZ. Here is the path I took, in darker blue.

I took the central path up to the summit, and talk about steep. When I was getting close to the summit I was stopping every 10 minutes to catch my breath before I moved on. The view of the crater and then the surrounding harbour from the summit was worth it though. It was cloudy and raining a little when I got to the top but I could still see for miles and miles. I skipped the lava caves because the torch(flashlight) I bought today wasn't charged out of the package, a common problem for explorers of any age. I got caught in a sudden heavy rainstorm on the way to the east coast, but I had my jacket and it only lasted 20 minutes.

The island looked very tropical at times, but the temperature was in the 70s most of the time, which was great. Since the opossum and wallaby eradication of the 1980s the island has no large animals. While walking through the bush there were no bird calls, and rarely the chirping of insects. It was a very tranquil feeling to hear nothing but the sound of my boots as I made my way. I met two German girls, Anita and Desiree, on the east coast and traveled with them through the uneven and exhausting East Coast Track back to Rangitoto Wharf, where I caught the 3:30 ferry back into the city. I bought groceries for the first time, made a delicious meal, and am now off to clean up, nurse my sunburned hands, and decide where I'm going tomorrow. Take care everyone.

Arrival

So here I am in the fourth night of my stay in New Zealand. So far everything has been amazing, and sometimes overwhelming. I'm trying to get used to 1. Learning the ins and outs of Kiwi culture, and 2. Learning the ins and outs of living in such a large city. Auckland is beautiful; very busy in the city centre but there are parks and natural areas dispersed throughout. After arriving at my hostel on Hopetoun Street in the morning, I took a walk through West Park while I was waiting for my room to open up. What an introduction to the city; the park is beautiful, right on the backside of the hostel.

After getting in, I traveled down stylish(and expensive) Ponosby Road and also walked down Karangahope Road. Crossing the Grafton Bridge from K'Road I ended up at the Auckland Domain, a huge city park with open fields for recreation, flower gardens, walking trails, and the enormous Auckland Museum.Here are the pictures I took that day:



After sleeping in the next day I decided to catch a bus to Mount Eden in the south part of Auckland. The extinct volcano is the tallest in Auckland at almost 200 meters above sea level. It was a refreshing walk, the slopes pastoral with cows grazing alongside the path. There was a main path of red gravel and also dirt paths, lots of options for outstanding views of the surrounding city and harbor to the north. Returning back to the hostel I found a new person in the room, Nick a Brit freshly arrived from Fiji, so we made our way up to K'Road and had an interesting night at the pubs. We learned that the gay bars aren't quite so obvious as you may think, and ended up having a pint at two or three before we caught on.



Yesterday morning I got a cab from the hostel to take my to my new place in the Columbia apartment complex. I am staying in a tiny three-bedroom apartment. There is not really a common area, just a kitchenette, restroom, and shower, but at around $600 a month it's a pretty good deal for the inner city. I have a seldom-there roommate from Italy named Marco for now. I met Nick at the Sky Tower at noon and we hopped a bus to the Auckland Museum inside the Domain. The museum was very interesting, and massive. There were three floors but we were only able to make it to two. The first floor was mostly focused on the cultural history of New Zealand, European and Maori, and the cultures of the peoples of the hundreds of South Pacific islands to the north. The second floor displayed the natural history of New Zealand and its wildlife. The volcano exhibit was neat; they had rocks formed from many different types of magma. Some of them were very heavy, dense with rare minerals.

After the museum we went back to the hostel to pick up Rachel, a Tennessee native taking a sailing class in the harbor for a week, and took a bus to One Tree Hill, the second-tallest volcano in Auckland, south of Mount Eden. The road up it was paved, and very steep. We took two rest breaks on our way up. We were amazed to see natives biking and running up the steep path. One young father was running while pushing his child in a stroller up the hill, while his wife kept pace alongside. The level of activity, and fitness, in this country is unlike anything I've seen in the US. The summit gave a beautiful 360 view of surrounding South Auckland, and we were able to see the terraces the Maori had carved into the slopes of the volcano years ago. No crops are planted there now; instead sheep graze the slopes.

Returning to central Auckland we journeyed to K'Road again and fared better this time at the pubs, not being accosted by spirit mediums, angry Russians, or flirtatious transvestites like the night before.



I unpacked today and cleaned up the apartment; my body needed some rest after the 8 hour plus days of walking. Tomorrow I'm going to catch the ferry in the morning out to Rangitoto Island, New Zealand's newest volcano, for a day of hiking. My address is:

15 Whitaker Place
Apt 14E3
Grafton Auckland 1010
New Zealand

The address for my photo albums is http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/dustinrcollins although I think you can just click on the slideshow to bring the page up. I'll be in touch; leave me some comments.

Prologue

If you're reading this you probably already know, but my name is Dustin and I'm a senior at the University of Northern Iowa. I'll be heading to the Auckland University of Technology to study computer science and electrical engineering for a year. More importantly, I'll be exploring New Zealand for the better part of a year. Here is where Auckland is, on the North Island.

I'll be living and studying in the main business suburb of Auckland, called Auckland City. It will be the end of summer in New Zealand, about 70 degrees every day. I'm going to try and travel some of the colder South Island before winter, cooler and rainy, hits in May or June. I made sure to buy sunscreen for the first few months there. The hole in the ozone layer above makes it easy to get burnt in 15 minutes, no joke for an Irish American.


I've been hanging out in the Danish hamlet that is Kimballton for the better part of two months now, but I'll be bidding Iowa farewell on Feb 10th and hopping planes to St. Louis, Los Angeles and finally Auckland. Since the plane will cross the date line I'll arrive on Feb 12th at 6:30am. I've booked a hostel for a couple nights while I get my bearings in the city(home to 1.2million people) and go apartment hunting.

Sooner than later I'll start posting up as many pictures as possible. It'll definitely be an experience; I can't wait to jump in to the Kiwi lifestyle. I haven't decided what I'm going to do about a phone yet, but I'm going to try to set up Skype before I leave and then try to find a good deal on a local cell when I get there. Leave me some comments/advice.