Rain at last, cold and rain at last!

OK - so I shouldn't be that excited about cold and rain greeting me as I leave the airport - but hello New Zealand! ... I feel like I am home.

Really - cold, rainy, windy - it's fantastic. And everyone here jokes about the 4 seasons of weather in a day in Auckland - amazing but true - you can be shaking out your umbrella and trying to find your sunglasses at the same time.

I have also apparently arrived at party central. Less than 6 hours off the plane, my dorm in its entirety was at the pub, I was the lame-o that left after 2am... my excuse was I had been traveling for 24hours. My dorm mates apparently spent 2:30am - 6am drinking in the hostel elevator, and managed to get up at 3pm for breakfast. Welcome to Auckland. Everynight after has pretty much been the same, and my liver is woefully out of shape.

Sally (thanks Sally) connected me with a friend of hers, Vicky, in Auckland, who took me out to the beautifull black sand beach of KareKare, the top of Mt. Eden (volcano cone in town) and for great Kiwi ice cream. Woo-hoo! Vicky also fed me a home cooked meal of lamb and gravy, Mauri potatoes (Kumara), squash and more... yum.

Since I am not getting a tremendous amount of sightseeing done in Auckland, tomorrow I am heading off to the bay of Islands - one of the 1001 things to do before you die. Can't wait to get out!