Hard To Believe

I am constantly amazed at how quickly the time is passing here.  This week it seems to have accelerated even more.  The Stewarts just arrived and they have already left, and tomorrow I will have been here for two months.  That is almost the half-way point of the New Zealand portion of this adventure.

That being said, it was truly an awesome experience having friends from home here to travel with.  Our big adventure was to Rotorua where we found 'hidden' (they were mention on Google, so they weren't really hidden), free hotsprings and mudpots, we watched twilight settle over Lake Rotomo from the yard of our cute little rental house, and we enjoyed a lovely afternoon frolicking and picnicking at Ohope Beach. One the way back we passed through Napier.  It was rebuilt after an earthquake in 1931, so the architecture in the whole town is very Art Deco. More pictures of all the fun are on the Photos and Videos page.

After a short stall in my project, my ethics application finally received approval!  Also, this week has brought me several new connections as well as a distribution list for getting my survey out.  I am very grateful for that!

We are also celebrating the birthday of Carlo and Felix who are 12 years this year.  Again a reminder of how fast time flies.  We celebrated with friends at home in January, and they got to have another party with some new friends here.

Tomorrow we leave for Tongariro National Park.  We will just be spending two days exploring two of the volcanoes.  This should be fun.  We are going with most of the Fulbrighters plus a couple of instructors from the Victoria University.