Other Adventures of the Weekend

This weekend was very fun-filled and jam-packed! It started off by going with some students kayaking for their outdoor education class. We took the school car, so I had to drive on the other side of the road for like three hours! It really isn't that bad, but it got confusing at some intersections knowing which lane to turn into. I was able to follow the bus so that when I was driving on my own it was no problem.

Here is the bus with all the kayaks.

This was our nifty little Toyota Corolla we got to take.

The first place the students stopped to go kayaking was Taupo.

This is Huka Falls just outside of Taupo. This is was just a minor stop on the way, and it is part of the river they were kayaking down, but obviously not the part they were doing.

This was the group that we went with. They are mostly Year 12, and they are all taking this outdoor education class.

The group was divided into two. Courtney went kayaking with the first group. They all had to wear those skirts and very warm clothing because they were anticipating rolling the kayak and getting wet.  

 While they kayaked, the other group went into the town of Taupo to explore. It was very similar to the main street of Thames, Pollen Street, but there were at least five of these streets. There were a ton of cafe's and clothing shops as usual. It was the largest town I have been to yet, and you can tell it's pretty touristy.

This is an example of one of the streets. It's very similar to the other towns but just way bigger.

You could pay to do this "Hole in 1" challenge. Obviously the main goal is to make it into the hole out in the lake. It seemed pretty hard, and I definitely wouldn't pay to do it. Apparently you get a prize if you make it, but I'm not sure what that prize is. 

Overall, Lake Taupo was huge. It was really pretty, and the town offered many activities around the area such as skydiving, parasailing, cycling, and different tours. The town was also filled with many motels/hotels for people to stay at. I'm glad I came to this town because I probably wouldn't have otherwise, but the main thing to do would be to shop unless you wanted to spend a ton of money doing all the extra stuff!

There was one part of the lake that had a nice beach for people to stay at. It was a nice lake to be on, and you don't see many houses on the shore like you would around all the lakes in MN.

The students were going on a harder kayaking trip the following day, and their instructor thought they needed more practice, so unfortunately I didn't get to go kayaking. Courtney did say it was pretty hard, so maybe that was for the best! I did, however, get to camp out overnight with the students. We started heading down towards Napier. We didn't quite go all the way, but this is where we camped out.

You can see our next desitination (Tongariro National Park) as well!

The students had to make sure they had packed a tent, and plenty of warm clothes. Luckily, two other teachers, Zac and Karien, made sure Courtney and I had plenty of warm clothes for our night, and Petro let us borrow some sleeping bags. We were in charge of cooking our own dinner for the night, so everyone brought little cookers of their own.

Here is one set up that some of the students had. These students decided to have a BBQ even though it was completely dark, so here they are cooking bacon. Other students just decided to warm up some pasta in their pans or whatever worked. It was pretty interesting seeing these students preparing all their food because I had never done anything like it before.

The tent we built and slept in was a three-person tent (like the ones in this picture), so Courtney and I stayed in a tent with the only other girl that went on the trip. 

In the morning, the students headed out bright and early for their second kayaking trip (which was too hard for Courtney and I), and we headed on to our next adventure, the Tongariro Crossing! That will be posted in another post, however.

On Sunday, our last stop was Waitomo Caves to go and see the glow worms! Besides New Zealand, glow worms have only been found along certain parts of the coast in Australia. 

Unfortunately, you can't take pictures inside of the caves, but we were able to get some outside. The tour starts off with a small tour through the caves and some explanations about the structures and a little bit of history behind the discovery of the cave. They are still unsure why the worms glow. They have some guesses, and I think they think it has something to do with a reaction of what they eat and possibly in their digestive system, but I'm not sure. After walking through the cave, they take you along a boat. There are cords on the ceiling that our guide dragged our boat through the water on. It was super cool! Almost like looking up at a ton of stars. 

I didn't take this picture, but this is basically what it was like. You can google a ton of pictures to see more similar pictures.

Our guide said that glow worms spend most of their time creating this string like substance in which they catch their food (other insects). That's why they are found in caves where there is water because then their tends to be more food. They feel the vibration of a bug hitting it and then know that they have something. Apparently the worms are about the size of a matchstick..

Here is a picture of the cave we came out of. It was pretty cool, and I know it's something I can't really do anywhere else!

You can see our boat heading back to go and pick up the other people.

This weekend was super fun, but very tiring! It was almost non-stop driving, walking, or exploring. Definitely worth it though because I got to experience so much!