Rangitoto and Chinese Lantern Festival

Overall this was a great Saturday-full of lights, sweat, natural beauty, laughter from 16 girls, yummy food (I got a Turkish wrap that was spicy, and full of meaty flavor-I love lamb-, and of course the pineapple ice cream, which combines the goodness of fruit and the delicacy of ice cream), heaps of people, successful bus maneuvering, and finding the cutest swimsuit (stay tuned for other blog posts) and some souvenirs for my classroom and friends. Hands under ground, one of the best Saturdays of my life-which is what makes them so precious, because they don't happen often, but when they do, it is worth the wait for the next good one. I'll remember this day for a long time. And, I'm excited to be sore, because it means I walked and persevered. Isn't that what makes a day wonderful?

My favorite lantern-a simple vase of flowers


The ugly duckling has hope :D

Sheep lanterns...Guardians of the festival

Kara and I enjoying the festival


The crowd at one part of the festival-this is on the farther area of Albert park where thousands gathered to celebrate Chinese New Year. Booths, shops, food, lanterns, concerts, and dances were performed throughout the night.

For this Chinese New Year the Year of the Rabbit was celebrated.

Cool dragon lantern. I found out that I was born in the year of the horse and that my best match is with someone in the year of the tiger. It was cool to read my Chinese zodiac and find out about how the 12 animals were picked by Buddha to be the representatives of the different years. Those animals that went to visit him before he died were given the honor of being the animals of certain years. The first animal to visit him was the rat so he got the first year. then in chronological order, Buddha honored the other 11 animals and they were given years to represent as well.

Lotus Flower-I was shocked by the swastika sign too

Pineapple Ice Cream!! YUM!

Chinese New Year Festival

Pretty view of the warf

Christine and I at Wilson Bay

Mom, you'll love this one-a beautiful lighthouse at the bay-I took it with you in mind. Here was my thought process: "Ohh, a pretty lighthouse! Oh my goodness, I have to take a picture of it, so that my mom can see it and smile. Sweet, got a great picture to post on my blog and show my mommy."

Entrance to one of the lava cave openings-I went in the other one that was longer, and it was super dark, but thanks to Hannah for being prepared with a flashlight (torch as it is called in New Zealand), I made it through and didn't get really dirty. It was cool just holding onto the walls and walking/crawling slowly through the narrow cave. I haven't really climbed in a cave before, so it was an experience. I will say that I was so happy to see the light at the end of the tunnel :) A friend took a picture of me actually walking, but I'll see if I can get it in the new few days.

Just a pretty overlook on the way to the lava caves

This was the view of Auckland that I got from the Summit-it was really easy to hike for half of it, and then near the top, the hill was straight up and so I put on a smile, thought of McBee hill in Benton City, and just was grateful I didn't have to run it. Man, was I sweaty though after that 2 km walk-but then again, I booked it for walking speed. Supposedly it was supposed to take us an hour, and Emily, Jessica, Nicole, Kara, and I got it done in 40 minutes! Dang, are we awesome or what.

Me in the cooled lava rocks

Rangitoto Island-the beginning before we got all sweaty :) This is part of our group-we had 14 of us all there, so it was loud and fun to all walk and sweat together. We had no idea how much walking we were going to do, and I couldn't believe we actually walked for near 5 hours, with maybe an hour break at the Wilson Bay area-we even had to hike there! It was gorgeous though-so many beautiful igneous rocks, large willow trees, green fauna, and great hiking trails.