Today was harder than I thought it would be. I officially said goodbye to my Contiki group and am on my own for the rest of my trip. It's amazing the bonds and friendships you can make in a few short days. I already made plans to meet up with Kristin once I am back in Chicago and will probably start looking at flights to London to visit Laura.
Backtrack to yesterday. We left Paihia and began our drive back to Auckland, where most of the group went to the Sky Tower. However, Annalieke (Holland), Bruno, and myself set to the docks to sail an Americas Cup sailboat. It was pretty friggin awesome. The mast of this sailboat was 134 feet and we helped raise and lower it with the crew members. We even got to go below deck and pull in the giant sail, which was neat and mildly claustrophobic. Afterwards the three of us got ice cream and met up with people for happy hour. The bar in our hotel has a stunning view of the harbor; don't worry I took a picture for everyone. Then after dinner we hit a bar called Dany Doolans which had live music and was incredibly lively for a
Wednesday night. Jasmine, Kimbo, Laura, & Kristin had gone to the wineries so I didn't see them out, which stunk because Kimbo and Jasmine left early this morning, so I didn't get to say goodbye. Jasmine left me a note and I know we'll keep in touch and maybe see each other when I'm in SoCal for work. I ate breakfast this morning one last time with everyone and then went down to the lobby with the other people finishing their tours to say goodbye and wave off the bus. I then went to the Sky Tower which is the tallest building in the Southern Hemisphere and the views were breathtaking. You can see across the bays to all the islands and volcanoes.
Shortly after I left and got my luggage and grabbed my car. It's a little Toyota Yaris and I drove about 20 seconds before I realized the guy at Apex had put on the parking break....awesome, I'm already breaking crap. My drive today was about 3.5 hours due to some construction and a few accidental detours. Good news was I caused no accidents and only got honked at once! Learning where the left side of you car is incredibly difficult, my depth perception of the car is all wonky. New Zealand doesn't have expressways or tollways like we do back home so every town you go through has a speed reduction, but that wasn't the worst park of driving. No, that honors goes to the hills. These hills and switchbacks make the blue ridge highway in North Carolina like child's play. I don't get car sick-ever- but I got a little woozy after a while. I was so happy to finally make it to Rotorua.
