COROMANDEL

Hi! I just wanted to give you a tour of my weekend. I went to Coromandel. It is a peninsula that is widely known as the best place to go in New Zealand. The weather was perfect and it was only a 3 hour drive from where I'm staying in Auckland. We stayed in a cabin that was 100 steps from Hot Water Beach. Why is it called that? Scroll down and take a look!

This is the beach in Prince Caspian where the train takes them to this random beach and they are in narnia! So beautiful. it's called cathedral cove. The hole behind me is the cathedral. The ceiling is amazing in there.

This is, just as it says, "A DAMN GOOD DRINK" Hey come on I'm just saying what it says on the bottle. so good.

So when the tide is low you can dig and the water underneath the sand is hot because of the magma beneath the beach. So you have this little hot tub made of sand. and it's so nice. We did it at night time when the tide was low at 1am and it was wicked cool because we were the only people on the whole beach and the stars were so pretty.


We stayed in a really nice cabin and we had a lot of fun in there.

Weekend

On Friday we went to the NZ temple and did baptisms. It is a really pretty temple.

That night 3 of us went to a dance...this is what we do every weekend. We go to a dance. Then we go to Denny's. Same Denny's as american Denny's. and we don't get home until at least 3am.

This is us at Pasifika. Pasifika is where all the islands of the Pasific come together in one park and each island has a chunk. In their chunk they have authentic food from that island, merchandise, and entertainment.

 

I got a Ukulele from the Cook Islands!!! Custom. Beautiful. Great sound. And I already learned how to play a song on it.

This is a coconut that was full of coconut milk. So good.

Update

Well I am better.  Thanks.  I missed a day of school then I went home early on Thursday.  On Friday we went to the sky tower (The tallest building in the southern hemisphere) And we had lunch there.  It was like a 5 star restaurant and it rotated the tables around the entire circle of windows within an hour.  It was amazing.  I had snapper.  And an amazing chocolate dessert that almost killed me it was so good.  

That was Heather.

Then we went to a museum and I got all tired and fatigued but I was fine.

 

K well we got this email getting ready for the dance.  And it was from one of our observers for

 when we teach- she's in her 30s and her parents live in Kere Kere, NZ which is 4 hours north of auckland.  She said "I can only take two of you" and michelle and I were first to reply so we got dibs. 

 The Sand was made up of shells guys.  It was bomb dig.  Click to enlarge.  Check out my Chaco tan.

We were at the dance then denny's till 3am then left at 9am this morning.  Man it is gorgeous here.  We're here until tomorrow afternoon.  It's been beautiful, I'm 190 percent better.  I love my life.

Don't ask me about anything beyond April 7th or the fact that today means there is only one of every number of the month left.  

something funny

me: hahaha

  oh gina

  one night I couldn't sleep

  and I was listening to classical music on itunes

5:27 PM Gina: yeah?

 me: and out of no where after a song ended this voice says "good night hallie, sweet dreams"

 Gina: haha

 me: I seriously jumped off the couch

  it was YOUR voice from grandma's house

 Gina: how was it on iTunes?

 me: I emailed the text to myself

  and it downloaded the sound as well

  FREAKED me out

 Gina: i'm laughing

  so hard

5:28 PM hallie, you gotta write that one down

  that's really funny

  and freaky

5:29 PM i bet you totally fell asleep after that

 me: rigghhhht

  k I'll really let you go now

5:30 PM but I love you and you creep up on me even when you are half way across the globe!

 Gina: ok, well thanks for sharing that

  love you lots!



Funny huh.

Choice week

Last week my teacher was sick so I visited the other byu girl's classrooms. And I hit every grade cool huh. And I decided that I really like the older kids as well as the younger - it's just the in-betweens that I've never enjoyed watching or teaching because it was the most awkward time of my life and I don't like to be reminded.

But yeah so the 5th grade teacher totally took advantage of my art skills and I made tsunami waves on one wall and a soccer goal on another. I taught the kids about goals and they wrote their goals on soccer balls then kicked an actual ball on the wall where the goal was and I put their goal ball where their ball hit. A lot of people missed but hopefully it won't be like that for their real goals.

And I had a really amazing weekend guys. I went to this cool music festival and it was outside and there was an orchestra and opera singers and normal singers and one guy sang bohemian rhapsody and it changed my life. And there was a laser show and fireworks at the end and I loved that as well.

Wish me luck!

Carol McCormack

This is the teacher of the class I will be in for the next six weeks. I found this picture of her on the school's website. I'll meet her tomorrow. Here is what else the website says:

In Room 11 we are a "Family' and as a family we nurture one another and learn with and from each other.

Our aim is to produce "Quality Work'. This is the best I can do and it takes time and effort.

Rotorua

Rotorua is a place in the middle of the north island where there are lots of geysers, like at yellowstone. there are also caves and lakes and mountains. I love Rotorua because it has a lot of stuff going down.

I slept over at my friend's house because it was her burday and we got picked up at 5 am. Luckily the back seat folded down flat so we slept the whole way on what was just like a BED!

We arrived at the blackwater rafting co where they do guided cave tours on tubes. We got in these wet suits. They were already wet. Then we put on a jacket. then shorts over that (why shorts?) then a helmet with a light on it. I think I sprained my finger just getting those things on me.


Then we walked to this hole in the mountain and it was actually the entrance of these amazing caves. With special creatures inside. GLOW WORMS!

I found out at these caves that I am claustraphobic. It was so dark and some of the tunnels we crawled through were really small. with water. There was no way out other than getting through. It was kind of hard on me but only half of the time it was confined.

So yeah the other half of the time was fun though because we jumped off cliffs into the water below and stuff. And when we turned off our headlights and put our feet in the pits of the person in front of us that was comforting. The glow worms were really awesome. It felt like we were up in space looking at the stars. so cool.

After the caves guess who showed up. The prime minister of New Zealand. And i am not joking I promise! John Key shook our hands and took pictures with us. He was so nice. I met the prime minister guys. Crazy.



Then we went ZORBING! It's where there is this 10 foot ball with a ball inside of it. And you crawl with up to two others inside the ball inside. And there is water in the inside ball. And then you ROLL down a hill! It is soo so sos sooo fun. I am totally going to start a zorbing business in Utah.
I fell on my face coming out.

Then we went to a dinner/theater. It was really good food with mussels and lamb, chicken, pork, pasta, salad, rolls, potatoes, squash, etc.
the 12 girls all slept in one room of a member's house. It was so fun! We watched A Goofy Movie.

The next morning I saw real kiwi birds, like the picture on my title. They are nocturnal so we walked into a dark room and could barely make them out. But one came right up to the window where I was and was clicking his beak on the window. Haha they are so cute. We also watched a Haka, like the team does before the BYU football games. That is a maori NZ dance. I loved watching that, it's kind of scary.


Half of the group, including me, decided to go to the single's valentine's dance at the stake center. It was really fun. After the dance we went to denny's and we didn't get home till 4am. funny huh.