Living the good life!

Hello! I hope everyone is doing great! I miss you! I have so much more once again.

After our last free day we prepared for an 8 hour hike and on Thursday morning we woke up bright and early and took off for the mountains. I had no idea what was in store. By 'hike' i thought they meant a nice walk for a long time like we usually do but it turned out to be the hardest thing i have ever done...8 hours in intense heat and steep rocky mountain terrain. We got to see Mt. Doom which is in Lord of the Rings. It was very hot and quite difficult but it was such an accomplishment. I loved it sorta ;) I put up some pictures from the lovely hike. Afterwards we were all very sore and layed low for the night. The next day we went white water rafting on a much calmer water and white water kayaking. That night we had a bon fire and made hobo pies...yum! It was a wonderful night. Yesterday we woke up early and jumped off of a dam, there were 20 and 40 foot jumps. I only made it off the 20 foot one, alittle too nervous for the large one (too many rocks). Next we loaded up the vans and headed for Wellington (the capital city) its beautiful!!!! Our van broke down temporarily on the way but its all good now and the drive was great. We are finally not camping!!! We are staying in our first hostel. Its actually quite nice, similar to a dorm room. We all went out last night to pubs and dinner and had quite a great time. This morning everyone was a little sluggish but we began our first day of classes nice and early. We hiked up a large hill that overlooks the city and that's where we had class. It was great. Tonight we are going to see a live band at the botanical gardens! I'm pretty excited. We're here 2 more nights and then we take the ferry to the south island!! I can't wait! The weather here has been amazing. This is incredible!

Well i gotta go to dinner now but I'll update soon. Love you lots! Miss you