Week 1 in NZ.

 

If you want to see what we are up to every day, check out our itinerary!!

Here is the link: Final-Packet—Student-Handbook-St-Olaf-New-Zealand-And-Australia-2018

What we’ve been up to.

After three long flights, we arrived in Auckland NZ. After our first night in the YHA hostel we woke up to a national holiday. Our first morning down under, we visited a festival to celebrate Waitangi Day. This is a contentious Holiday commemorating the Waitangi treaty between Maori chiefs and the colonial English. Some of the oles even got to swim in the ocean on our first full day. Hopefully not too many of us got sunburned.

Our second day, we got to experience more about Maori Culture as we visited a traditional Marae. We learned Maori words, a song, and more about their history.

On Thursday, we took a bus to Goat Island Marine Reserve and took a walk along the cliffs of the reserve. Many of us took a swim in the waves before we learned about different marine life that lives here.

Friday was a highlight for many of the oles here in NZ. Before lunch we made our way to the Glow worm caves and got to see the glow worms light up the rock walls above us. In the afternoon, we rode to Hobbiton where many Lord of the Rings fans got to satisfy their childhood dreams of visiting the Shire.

On Saturday, we woke up in Rotorua and visited Te Puia. Here we were able to watch a Maori performance, see the geothermal geysers and mud pools, and even have our lunch cooked by the hot steam.

Check out some pictures of our adventures!!