Arrival

Finally made it to New Zealand! After a 2 hour flight to Cleveland, in a plane that was too small to stand up straight in, and sounded/felt like it was going to fall apart at any moment (a real stressful two hours let me tell you). Then a 4 hour flight to LAX, the cutest 9 week old baby next to me (surprisingly quiet-but not the 2 year old behind me who screamed the entire time). Then I waited in the LA airport for hours, and I'm talking like 12 hours. I sat in a food court for a few hours then happened to run into a friend of mine who is also here in NZ. About 9 hours late we finally boarded our Qantas flight to NZ. The flight was 13 1/2 hours but luckily when we boarded it was 3:00 am East Coast time so I had already been awake for 24 hours and got to sleep 9 hours on the flight. Awesome! Everyone is super nice. There are 19 girls and 6 guys. Once we got off the airplane, we headed through customs-easy! Then got in vans and drove a very curvy road to the EcoQuest camp. New Zealand is incredibly beautiful. Incredibly beautiful (it's worth repeating). There are rolling hills everywhere! Sheep and cows everywhere, and right now the lambs and calves have just been born. Today is September 1st (what kiwis consider the first day of spring). The camp overlooks the Coromandel peninsula which is steep with mountain ranges. The beach is really nice and wide, and everywhere you can smell the salty ocean. All around camp there are fruit trees, which we can pick fruit from. The area that I am in is called Whakatiwai (pronounced with an "F" sound for the "Wh") it's in the Firth of Thames. Every time I turn around I just gasp at how beautiful it is. We are in such a lovely spot. My roommate is named Anna and our little cabin overlooks a banana tree, which also has this sweet nectar that you can use as a sugar substitute. Amazing! Everything is sustainable. We grow our own food, have a compost pile, source local meets, you name it, we have it. I'm so excited to be living with like minded people.