I woke up earlier than I have been lately and made breakfast. I lounged around the hostel and caught up on this blog. It was a nice day but I was perfectly content with relaxing inside for awhile. After a while, I got dressed, packed a bag, and headed outside. I stopped at a little store that had cute home furnishings and picked out a few things for Alison and David. I got them a Christmas card and a couple of sweets too. I dropped all of it off at the hostel and then went to catch the local bus.
It took me to Mount Maunganui CBD again. I went into quite a few shops that appealed to me but only ended up buying a swimsuit top. I sent emails and made phone calls that I needed to also. I went to Burgerfuel for dinner, which was pretty good. There were two cruise ships in port today so the town was especially busy. I walked over to the beach and enjoyed the sunshine and soft sand.
While relaxing and thinking I had a good hour or more to decompress, I realized that since it wasn't a weekday, the city buses might not be running very late. It was already 6:30 and so I hustled back into town and went over to one of the bus stops to look at the timetables. Sure enough, the buses had stopped running. For a Saturday night, I thought they would at least go until 10pm. I contemplated calling an expensive cab, hitch hiking, or making the hour and a half or more walk back to my hostel. I was at a bus stop bench on the main drag so a cab pulled over, thinking I was waiting for one. Just out of curiosity, I asked how much a ride would be, he said $25-$30. I said oh no thank you I'll walk or catch a free ride instead. We bargained for a minute, he went down to $20, then $18 but I didn't budge. I knew even $18 wasn't worth it since it's not a far distance in a car whatsoever. He was reluctant but said how about $15 and I obliged even though that was still a ridiculous amount but I didn't want to spend the majority of my night just walking back.
Back at the hostel, I began to organize and plan out ideas for when Cassela and Michealla arrive. I took a break and cooked up the rest of the vegetables I bought. I continued researching and making lists of places to go and things to see on both islands. It was getting a little bit late so I went to the dorm room. One of the Europeans in the room and I started talking and he asked if I wanted to join him and the others in his group down at the waterfront. I thought, what the heck why not, and the five of us walked through the quiet streets to the harbor. We found a spot on the boardwalk and cracked a few warm beers. The moon was coming up over the water and had a brilliant orange color and was massive. And the lights of the Mount Maunganui area reflecting on the ocean were so pretty. We all exchanged our travel plans and what we thought of New Zealand. After a bit, we went back to the hostel but not until we had a funny interaction with a drunk guy who had just left the bar and was stumbling through the streets.
