June Gloom/Exams Over!!

Hey guys, its been awhile since I have posted anything and I apologize but I have been super busy. The last few weeks of school were super tough and it seems like the professors saved all the work for the end of the year (they always do that). Couple that with rugby and you get NO LIFE. Anyways, after lectures finished here we were given about 4 weeks that just consists of exams. Some people have all the exams in the first week, which really sucks, i'm glad I wasn't them. I had one exam early on and then 3 towards the end of the month. I also unfortunately developed a strong drug addiction......coffee. My 4 week exam period all meshed into one long day as soon as I took one swig of that venti brewed coffee. Sleep was not an option, coffee was. Anyways I think I did very good on all of my exams at the expense of any sleep. However, I am now making up for that time period by sleeping in to ridiculous hours and purposely trying to do as little as possible. I am succeeding. The last few days I have actiually gotten to do some local travel to some of the islands around Auckland. There are so many places to see that are nearby and easily accessible. Adventures are never far off and the areas around Auckland are fairly uncongestid. At the beginning of the year I went to the volcanic island of rangitoto which is a 30 minute ferry ride out of auckland. I went back there to go for a run around the island and took a different route than last time. The trail I took was supposed to stay next to the water but 1 hour later I ended up in like some jungle and pretty much couldn't see anything around me. Eventually the trail lead to a bay that provided some great scenery. However, the scenery was interupted by a pair of skinny dippers. Thought it was some species of albino seal at first.....then quickly realized it was not. Anyways thats about the time I decided I should get back on the trail and head back to the ferry. 2 days later I went to the island of Waiheke. Waiheke, unlike Rangitoto, has a few little towns and some very nice beaches. I went with a friend I met on the ferry ride back from Rangitoto and we decided to pretty much improvise the whole trip. When we got there, we originally planned to rent some bikes and ride around the island in order to get a work out while we experienced what the island had to offer. This was quickly shot down by a scottish dude that pointed out we were probably not in good enough shape to ride the bikes. Wow, pretty demeaning. Before we could even refute, the guy flagged someone down to take us to the scooter rental. This actually ended up being awesome. We rented 2 yellow scooters that were perfect for getting around the island. Although they could only go so fast, there was often a line of cars behind us probably pretty pissed off. Especially when going uphill. Scooters don't have much horsepower. Anyways, we had no idea where we were going and everytime we picked a place on the map to go, we would pretty much end up getting lost. We would just settle for wherever the road took us. By the way driving on the other side of the road is not as hard as it sounds. Anyways, we ended up finding some cool beaches and stopped at some nice viewpoints to take some pictures, I hope you guys enjoy them. I'm going to be doing a lot of traveling in the next few weeks so I will make sure to put a blog up at the end of my semester break. Hope everyone back home is doing well, definitely miss everybody. Hakuna Matata.

Rugby

Hey everyone, it has been awhile since I have updated so I figured I would fill you in on what I have been doing the past couple weeks. I haven't had much time to do any traveling because I had tests to study for, so not much of an update there. I have had Rugby games every Saturday for the last couple weeks and it has been quite a journey. First of all I'll tell you about the Rugby club. The Rugby club has its own set of Rugby fields that are about a 15 minute train ride from the city. Every Saturday, I hop on the train with some other team mates and head to the game. The train ride is actually pretty amazing, you get to see a lot of the nice areas outside of the city which mainly consists of green hills leading right up to the ocean which always seems to have a turquoise tint. The actual Rugby Club building is pretty cool as well, there is a full on bar inside and they also serve some awesome food (by awesome I mean burgers, hot dogs, and fries) that tastes amazing after a game. The game itself is intense to say the least. My position is loosehead prop, I have the honor of completely destroying my body by the end of a game. The prop is in the front line of the scrum which is that giant mob pushing against eachother if you have ever seen a rugby game. After the scrum you pretty much never get a break. You are always running to secure the ball for your team, or you are running the ball straight up to consistantly gain a little extra yardage, or you are on defense trying to tackle. So there is absolutely no break. Which is why after the game there is always a couple cold beers waiting for you on the sideline (I don't condone this activity for those of you trying to lose weight). Then there is the boat races..........The boat races are not what you think. Kind of like the decieving word "crosstraining" some of you know what that ACTUALLY means and no it is not any type of physical activity. The "Boat Race" is a drinking competition. Few members of the rugby team are selected to compete against the other teams in trying to down a "jug" of beer the fastest. Here I thought I was going to learn to sail but instead I get thrown into the midst of a drink off. Well needless to say we usually do pretty well. Not sure if thats a good thing or a bad thing. As for the members of my team, alot are native to new zealand but a lot are also international. Some of my good friends on the team are from India, the Netherlands, England, Sri-Lanka, France (we refer to this guy as "Frenchie"), and also Chile. It makes for a lot of fun having a team with so many different nationalities. Well I guess the only other thing to address would be our record...........we suck. We havent won a game yet. We are getting better though, we played a good team the other day and only lost by 2 tri's (like touchdowns) which believe it or not is good for us. Its a work in progress. Well I hope you guys enjoyed the blog and I hope everything is going well back home. Keep workin hard and show everyone that Stevenson Fitness is the best gym out there!!!

Back packing/Tongariro Crossing

Ok, so I am not sure really where to start. This last week might have been the most eventful week of my life. 1st thing is first.......I booked a series of bus rides to go down south to Lake Taupo and Tongariro National Park. Tongariro is more famously known for Lord of the Rings as it is one of the main places where the movie was filmed. It is where Mordor and Mt. Doom are from the movie. I have a kathmandu backpack so I threw in a bunch of clothes and some hiking gear. Then it was time, I hoped on to a bus (its actually called the Naked bus im not sure why) and headed first to Taupo. The countryside was beautiful and we stopped in a few small towns that were very nice. One place we stopped was called Rotorua and this is a place where there is a lot of volcanic activity. There are hot springs all throughout the area and even in the middle of their parks there are hot springs with tape around them so people don't fall in (some are waaaay too hot). At the bus station there was even a small pool where people would put their feet in because it was heated by the geothermal activity. I got a quick bite to eat in Rotorua (Full stack of Pancakes with fruit and tons of whip cream) and then headed off to Taupo. Once we got to Taupo the dropped everyone off right by the lake (Lake Taupo). Lake Taupo is very pretty and the surrounding town has an alpine village type feel to it. I stayed at a hostel which was actually really nice and tried to get to sleep pretty early. However, the clubs in nz dont close until 4 or 5 in the morning so pretty much I had to try and sleep with crazy bass techno music playing extremely loud. The next morning I took some pictures of the lake and then hopped on the bus to Turangi which is the little town next to Tongariro. In Turangi I stayed at a BBH hostel (budget backpackers) which are very family oriented. At these hostels you share a room with usually 4 other people so you are forced to meet other people which is very cool. The people I roomed with were from Germany and Finland, and were very interesting to talk to because they were taking a year off from everything to travel the world so I got to hear some good stories. The next day was the hike. I packed some food and water as well as extra clothes into my smaller backpack and then Ian (the hostel owner) drove me to the start of the trail. Words and pictures do not do this hike justice it is absolutely amazing. It is about a 15 mile hike that starts off in the jungle where the only thing around you is trees, streams, and waterfalls. As you climb higher you break out of the jungle setting and enter a large meadow of tussock grass. At this point you can see steam from the hot springs coming off of the mountain. Climbing up the first mountain the scenery is spectacular but as soon as you get over the first peak you are treated with views of blue lakes, geothermal vents, volcanic cones and Mount Ngaurahoe (mt doom). You then drop into a valley with landscape that looks like your on the moon. Then you begin a short very steep climb up to the first volcanic crater (called red crater). The trail up to the crater is extremely difficult because it is all dried up pumas which is like walking through very soft sand. Once at the top though you can see inside the crater and have a great view of the lakes and surrounding hot springs. You can actually feel the heat coming off of the ground at certain points around the crater. After this there is a steep drop down into another valley and you are presented with a dilemma.......The majority of people continue on the same trail which heads through some nice grassy valleys and ends at a parking lot. However, if you want, or if you are stupid enough, you can take the trail up to Mt Doom. Now, most trails zig zag their way to the top of a mountain and provide a challenge but they are doable. Mt Dooms trail zig zags for literally about 5 minutes....and then you are on your own to hike straight up the volcano. You cant zig zag, you have to walk straight up and it is very very very very steep. The ground is once again dried pumas and so for every step you take up, you slide back about 3/4 of a step. I have been on some pretty tough hikes but they paled in comparison to this. It takes almost 2 hours to climb straight up and the only help you get is from a stretch of rocks that allow you to pretty much free hand rock climb up a third of the mountain but it is still extremely hard. Especially when it is cold, pouring rain, and gusting wind all around you. However, once you get to the top you are treated to an amazing view inside the crater of the mountain which almost looks surreal. if you wait at the top for a few minutes the clouds break every so often and you can see for about 60 miles all around you. Quite an experience. Going down the mountain is actually fun, the dried pumas allows you to pretty much slide down the whole mountain and it only takes about a half hour to get down. I hiked down to the parking lot with two german girls that were headed the the same way and thank god they gave me a ride back to town or else I would have to have waited another hour and a half for someone to pick me up. Well thats it for this blog, I will have another up soon as a lot has happened this week, hope fully I can get some pictures up on here if not check out my facebook I put a bunch up on there. Hope everyone is doing well!!!

School School School

Hey everybody. Haven't updated in a while so I thought I would keep you guys informed. I haven't done much the last couple weeks because I have been pretty swamped with school work. I have also had rugby practice so between the two I have been pretty darn busy. By the way.....rugby is awesome. Pretty much a combination of football, basketball, and soccer all into one sport. I highly suggest trying it if you ever get the chance. Just make sure to wear a mouth piece, I had a teammate lose a tooth at practice because he forgot to wear the mouthpiece......ooops!!! I do have some other updates though. For those of you looking to lose weight I have found the magical formula. Move to Auckland......The whole city is built over volcanic cones and so pretty everywhere you walk you are going uphill. I am honestly trying to gain weight so I don't get killed in rugby and it is almost impossible because each class I walk to is up a steep hill. Now throw in a backpack full of books??? Fat burning machine. I weigh close to 170 right now which makes me a dead man on the field. I also have been trying to cut costs wherever I can, so this includes going to a cheaper grocery store which happens to be an easy 15 minute walk downhill, and a ridiculous 30 minute climb back uphill. I have a two week break for the holidays and I promise I will travel and post some good pictures for you guys. Hope everyone is doing well. I saw the pictures from the great race and they looked awesome. Hope you guys are having fun back home!!!

Classes/Beach Trip/International Party

Ok, so I started my classes last week and they are all pretty cool. My Exercise science class is actually a Biomedical biology class that they are making us take. It is extremely hard but to say the least I am learning A LOT. The classes here are very cool. You are not in a small classroom with 30 other students, instead you are with around 600 other students in a giant stadium seating theater. There are 2 giant projecters that project onto 2 giant screens that show the relevant material for the day. The other cool aspect of classes is that there is not just 1 professor. We have around 5 or 6 professors that teach the class because they are experts in their specific field. So we change professors about every 3 weeks. I also learned the difference between chico state and a REAL university. I find myself studying pretty much all week long and even sunday is designated a full study day. Saturday, however, is for fun.

This saturday I hoped on a bus with the rest of the international students at the school. The bus took us to long bay which is a beach outside of auckland. The beach was very nice and the water was super clean. I was really surprised when I didn't see beer cans floating by with seaweed attached to them. I kind of missed that but oh well. I was also excited to play some sports with the other students but they all played cricket. I had no idea what the hell was going on so I just watched. After that, they served us lunch and then we all went into the water. It felt good to be in the ocean, however, when we got back from the trip I realized I had morphed into a lobster. The sun here is rediculously strong due to the lack of an ozone layer above new zealand. Who do I have to thank for this? Well that would be my lovely neighbor Los Angeles. Thanks.

After the beach everyone took a nap to save energy for the saturday night festivities. What festivities would that be? Well anyone who knows me that well understands that festivities, when translated to chicoenese, means party. So we all got dressed up and hit the auckland clubs. Definitely fun, thats all im going to say about that e-mail me for details. Well I definitely miss everyone back home so I hope you all are doing well. Those of you going to stevenson fitness get excited for the new gym. The new website looks amazing!!! Chris who is the girl on the front page? Anyways have a great everyone i'll be back on next week!!

Rangitoto

Ok, so last weekend I went with a bunch of other international students to Rangitoto. Rangitoto is a volcanic island very close to Auckland. The island supposedly formed only 500-600 years ago so it is very new. We all met up and walked about 5 minutes from our hostel to the ferry. The ferry is only about 20nz$ which is the equivelant to about 15 U.S. dollars. The ferry ride took about 20 minutes and then we were on the island. It is very apparent that the island is young because when you get there, volcanic rock is everywhere. What is wierd is that there are plants everywhere growing out of the volcanic rock. We hiked up to the top of the volcano and walked out onto a ledge that lets you look into the crater. Now the crater is covered with plants and trees but you can definitely tell that it is a crater. Afterwards we hiked back down into some lava caves. Now the first cave we found was pretty cool and we tried to squeeze our way through the cave, but the next cave we found was huge. We actually could just stand up and walk through it, the only problem was that you couldn't see anything, it was pitch black. So all of us tripped about a hundred times trying to make our way through the cave. Eventually after a few hundred feet we made it out though. After this we hiked back down to the bottom of the island and decided we couldn't leave without jumping in the water. Now, none of us had brought any swimming attire so everyone just jumped in with their normal clothes on.......clearly a bad idea. On the ferry we all looked like we had peed our pants, especially me because the bottom half of my shorts were dry but the top half remained wet. Attractive. After a long day of hiking (about 5 hours), I went looking for some food on the ferry and found something I have never heard of. A carrot, orange, poppyseed muffin. What the hell is that. Well one of the other international students bought one and gave me a piece to try. By far, the best muffin I have ever tasted, I'll have to buy like a few packs of them and bring them home. Anyways, that was my weekend and now I am still in my first week of school which I will talk about in my next post. Hope everyone is doing well!!

Arrival

Hey everyone!!! So I have arrived in new zealand after a lovely 13 hour flight in a seat that could barely fit me. Luckily they had movies and shows to watch and luckily none of those were: cast away, alive, 9-11, airplane, airplane 2, or Lost. Once I arrive I took a taxi to my apartment and I have to say new zealand is a lot nicer looking and cleaner than southern California. There are also like no poisonous creatures which is pretty cool. I got to my hostel and found thatI am living with 2 people from hong kong and thaiwan. So I guess I wont be living with the 2 girls they originally had me with......crap. My roomates actually ended up being pretty cool and they are trying to teach me chinese its extremely hard though. I have traveled around the city and it is pretty amazing. It reminds of a mixture of both san francisco and seattle but much cleaner and not as many bums. The city was built on a bunch of dormant volcanoes and so walking around can get pretty tiring. It is funny though to see people walking back from the bars sweating profusely because they have to walk up a 600 ft hill to get to their appartment. It is also pretty cheap to get around, there are free shuttle buses that drop you off at different parts of the city which is pretty cool. Everybody here seams to think that I have a canadian accent, and I have no clue how they come to that conclusion but oh well. I am going to visit Rangitoto (Volcanic island off the coast) soon so I will post again about that. Hope everyone back home is doing great!!! To my clients: You guys better be workin your butts off I get feedback from your trainers lol.