More Auckland goings on

Ooh, its been quite a few weeks since I updated this – oops.

So what have I been up to? Well, over Easter weekend, we did quite a lot of stuff. On the Friday, me, Clare, Vicki and Niels went on a mini roadtrip in a camper van up north a little bit to some of the beaches up there. Niels works for a camper van company so we got a free one for the day – bonus. Our camper van was pretty cool and it was painted lots of bright colours and we got quite a few stares driving in it. We started out on Bethells beach. We were greeted there with lots of warning posters about the bad currents, waves and quicksand. Anyway, we had a nice walk along the beach there. Unfortunately, it was quite a cloudy day so we didnt really feel in the mood for sunbathing, we just had a walk and headed back to the van. When we got to the van, we discovered the lights had been left on and the battery was flat. We had to hail a passer by in the car park to help us jump start the van. That done, we headed up north a little bit further to Murawai beach. This was a black sand beach that was nice. The sand was so soft to walk on barefoot, it was lovely. We met lots of nice friendly dogs along the way. Then we drove further north to Shelley beach which was a pretty place with a playground. We had some fun on the swings – I can’t remember the last time I sat on a swing! I can’t remember the order of the day, but at some point, we stopped off at a Macademia nut cafe and had Macademia scones with cream and jam – it was yummy.

The next day, the Saturday, me and Clare went over to Rakino island for a jazz festival. This was cool. Rakino island is a tiny place behind Waiheke Island with not much there usually, but they hosted this jazz festival each year. It was a really nice, relaxing day. We sat on a hill overlooking the water and had some wine and a chicken sandwich and chatted and listened to the music. It was great! The next day was Easter day and Clare’s birthday. So we went for a 10k stroll along the waterfront to Mission bay. We took a picnic of Sushi and cheap pretend champagne and sat on a bench near the beach. It was really nice. Unfortunately, it then started chucking it down so we ran for cover under a big tree where we proceeded to carry on drinking our glasses of champers under a brolly. The rain didnt look like it was going to stop any time soon so we admitted defeat and went to find a pub to sit in! We found a nice cheap pub and had a cider. Unfortuantely, with the laws in NZ, you’re not allowed to drink on Easter day unless you’re eating food as well so we had to order some chips to go with our beer. I also took with me my easter egg of a packet of minstrels from the UK (NZ chocolate is horrible stuff) which went down pretty well. By the time we’d finished our ciders, it had stopped raining so we went back onto the beach and finished our bottle of bubbles before catching the bus back and going out for a curry in the evening. The poor waiter at the curry house – it was his first night and he got so much stuff wrong!! But it was ok and we got all the wrong orders thrown in for free! I do miss Birmingham curry’s though. They’re not the same over here!

The next weekend we went to Waiheke Island. That was fun. We got a ferry over on the Saturday (we had to go to free champagne on the Friday!! We got pretty drunk that night and had to go for a nice greasy breakfast on the Saturday morning at Denny’s before we could stomach the boat trip!) at midday. The ferry took about 45 mins and then we had to get a boat accross the island to the other side where the hostel was. We got there about 2 and had a little sunbathe. The scenery was beautiful and the sand was lovely and soft. It was amazing to think it’s only a short way away from Auckland, you feel miles away! The hostel was on top of a hill/cliff overlooking the beach, it was lovely. That evening we were going to have a bbq at the hostel, but taxis and busses are few and far between on Waiheke and it wasn’t really feasible to go to the supermarket miles away, so we ended up eating at the cafe on the beach. Then we went back to the hostel and had drinks. It was a nice evening as there was 8 of us who went and it was a really nice group. The next day was spent lounging on the beach again before heading home via a vineyard to sample some of the local wines  When we got home, I was supposed to go for a long run for my half marathon training... but I ended up going out and having potato wedges for tea instead! Oh well!

And last weekend, I went down to Hamilton for the weekend for Anna’s birthday celebrations. It was a nice weekend and we stayed at Anna’s boyfriends house. That’s the first time I’ve been in a house since December when I stayed at Rosario’s family for a few days. It was so nice to be able to lounge on a sofa without it being packed full of other backpackers. And it was a treat for me to have some toast! I don’t buy loaves of bread here as I cant freeze it and I dont eat it all in time so that was a real treat! We got there on the Friday night and went out to order Hell’s Pizza. This is a yummy gourmet pizza company that names its pizzas after the deadly sins and other things like that – they’re delicious! I also took some cheap fake bubbly with us as we were missing Friday champagne!

The next day we went for a tramp up mount Pirongia (I think that’s how its spelt anyway) and ran down it. The view was pretty cool, but we couldnt see as far as you could on a clear day as the cloud was down a little bit. We went into Hamilton for a nice lunch, where we told the waitress it was Anna’s birthday and got a free slice of chocolate cake – bonus! Then we went and bought lots of party food and alcohol for the party that evening. We went for the theme of childrens birthday party food so we had sausage rolls, cold pizza etc. We were going to do cheese and pineapple on sticks we had a bit of an issue trying to buy cocktail sticks so that didnt happen! Anna’s friends made her an amazing birthday cake of New Zealand. It was really good. I’ll try to put some pictures of it up on the blog when I can. Then we went out for a little boogie in Hamilton, but because of the V8 racing taking place there that weekend, everywhere was really full and was charging entry to all the bars, so we only went into the one place rather than visiting all of them. The next day, I really had to do a big long run for my training, so I ran round Hamilton lake 4 times which equals about 16k/10 miles I think. Glad I managed it, I was starting to get worried as I hadnt done a long run in a while. Then I treated myself to a great big burger fuel burger for lunch! That’s a gourmet burger company that does really nice burgers!!

And that’s about it for me for now, the week days are passing with me at work, going to the cinema (we went to see Date night last night) and going to team training twice a week.