Category Archives: New Zealand

We almost stayed in the smelly city for a couple weeks of retail work. The thought of it made me a bit nauseous, but the thought of making some money was appealing. Just in time, we received a reply from a couple in Central North Island saying we could come that very day (Saturday). SoContinue reading “chasing waterfalls and cleanliness.”

Kasey’s favorite waterfall in North Carolina is called Bridal Veil Falls. Our new favorite waterfall in New Zealand shares the same name. Here is the beautiful bride: Here are a few other pictures from Auckland (underrated city for sure. So many cool towns that are right on the water and also minutes from downtown). AndContinue reading “the bride’s veil.”

While doing help exchange, sometimes you end up in a general practitioner’s house with a hot tub, pool, and extravagant library, and other times you have to be strategic about using public bathrooms when you’re out so you don’t have to use the filthy bathroom at the place you’re staying. And that is the joyContinue reading “bacon.”

As I said when I first arrived, Wicked the Broadway Musical is playing in downtown Auckland. I’ve had some of my favorite evenings ever at Wicked (every time with Carlee Macon Buchanan who has changed me for the good). It’s been showing here for two months now, and if I hadn’t paid that $400 beefContinue reading “defying gravity.”

The weather in Northland turned very very ideal in the past few days, so we’ve been out by the pool and trying out new beaches and hiking to waterfalls. Here are a few photos:

We saw a sign for R&B music playing on Saturday evening, so we put actual clothes on (not bathing suits or pajamas or workout clothes) for the first time in a while and hit the town. The pub is also the restaurant that serves brunch all day and it’s attached to the hotel. So it’sContinue reading “ups and downs. prepare.”

At a couple of our jobs so far, we told our hosts that we aren’t pros at driving a stick shift, and because of this, we’ve walked distances we wouldn’t’ve chosen to walk since we couldn’t take the car. Well, Jan left her manual car and it’s the “dirty car” that goes to the beachContinue reading “Kasey can do it all.”

We are enjoying our dog-sitting gig in Northland. The water in Opononi has Crayola’s robin’s egg blue color to it: We spent the other day going over details about the house, kitchen, dogs, etc. so we could watch Holly, Moses, Buzz, and Muffin for about 10 days. Jan sometimes says “oh goodness, no, life is tooContinue reading “meercat.”

Northland Jan and Steve I was sad to leave Kennedy Bay and Raewyn. We spent our last night steaming our own mussels from the estuary 100 yards away and frying up fresh snapper that was delivered from a neighbor. I kept thinking, how can we beat this? What will this next place be like? WhyContinue reading “hot tub, cold pool, steamin’ coffee.”

This is the view on our way from Raewyn’s house to Coromandel Town, home of the coolest coffee shop/secondhand bookstore, Driving Creek Café. These are taken with my Canon Powershot from Aaron and Carlee, on the vivid setting…almost captured how blue the water was.