Shenanigans in Aoteoroa

Its been a fantastic cruise in New Zealand so far, I can't believe its almost over already. I've stayed really busy and tried to experience as much as possible to make the most of our time here. I'll catch you up on the happs:

In Bay of Islands I went parasailing with my friends Tim and Sophie, and we had a blast. I had done it once before in the caribbean, but my friends had never done it and talked me into doing it as a triple. So all three of us went up at once, on NZ's highest parasail, supposedly 1200 feet, though that seems unlikely. Afterwards we had some amazing ice cream - I tried a flavor called "hokey pokey" which was a vanilla/caramel ice cream with little chunks of honeycomb in it. Incredible!

Tauranga: I met up with my friend Hayden for the day. We walked around Mount Mauao and had a picnic on some rocks by the ocean, went swimming and bodysurfing in the waves at the public beach, and then met up with my friends Tim and Tracy for a game of miniature golf. We decided to play teams - America verses the South Pacific (Tracy and Hayden from AU and NZ respectively). America lost, Tim and I are sorry to admit. But it was tons of fun anyway, of course.

Auckland: I went out to breakfast with friends and had some great eggs benedict at a little cafe. Then the four of us made the most of our afternoon by going up in the sky tower to enjoy the view of the city, and then visiting Kelly Tarlton's Antarctic World to see some penguins and sharks. Penguins are amazing to watch.

After Auckland things got pretty interesting because of another cyclone we had to avoid. We weren't able to go to Napier as planned, so instead we arrived in Wellington a day early and got an unexpected overnight!! As you will know if you read my blogs, overnights are what we as crew positively live for. Imagine if you could only go out at night once every four months or so....you would be excited too. :-) Wellington's port closes at night, though, so we had a choice to make - you were either on or off the ship for the night by 10:30 pm, when they closed the gangway until 7am the next morning. We decided OFF, for sure!! :-) I booked a hotel room for the night on Wellington's happening-night-life Cuba Street, and shared the cost with three of the girls from the cast. It only cost each of us 30 bucks, and was totally worth it. The hotel was beautiful, the room was big, the beds and pillows were comfy, and we had a conveniently located base of operations for our big night out. My friend Nick lived in Wellington for 3 years and so knows the area perfectly and has dozens of friends there, and was able to take us around a bit. We had a nice dinner at a Thai food place, then we girls went back and relaxed in the hotel jacuzzi for a while before getting ready to go out later that night. It was so wonderful.... and we stayed out enjoying the nightlife until the wee hours, then were able to walk back to the hotel in just a few minutes, have a few giggles and a pillowfight, and sleep for a few hours before returning to the ship for rehearsal the next day. What a blast! The next day Nick took us around again, and got us free coffee at a nice cafe where he used to work. It was a fantastic unexpected couple of days. The guests were pretty unhappy with missing Napier and the change in itinerary, but I am only slightly ashamed to say that my friends and I couldn't have been happier. :-)

Today we were in Christchurch, and I cashed in my shore excursion work hours to take a full day tour on the tranzalpine train, out into the country. It was a gorgeous day for it, and I loved being out in the beautiful New Zealand countryside. We saw a few places where bits of Lord of the Rings and Narnia were filmed, and also got to stop at an old farm and see a sheep shearing and sheepdog demonstration.

And now?? I'm exhausted.....but happy. We are in Dunedin tomorrow, hopefully going to be able to go horseback riding, something Tracy has had her heart set on for months. We'll see if we can make it happen for her.

And yes, I did do some work this week....its not all fun and games. :-) We played the ABBA show again, my friend Mario D'Andrea, the Nat King Cole tribute we had last month as well, and one new one - a lady named Jenifer Green who did a tribute to Shirley Bassey. I loved my part in those charts. Tomorrow we're backing up a pianist who we've also had before, and then later a group called "Emporers of Soul"....which sounds suspiciously like another Motown tribute quartet. We shall see! Alright, enough with this too-long post!!

New Zealand again!

I just finished a pretty awesome cruise. Tracy's parents were on board and spoiled our little group a bit taking us out for drinks and ordering room service for us a couple of times. My good friend Daniel (pianist on the Voyager and my first two weeks on the Rhapsody) was on board for the week signed into one of the crew cabins, and it was great to see him again and catch up. Another of the cast had her sister on board, so I did some of what we affectionately call babysitting - taking care of her while her sister was working or busy. It was quite the social week, and a lot of fun. I'm a little tired after it, and after playing all those extra sets. But I'm pretty fired up for NZ again this cruise. I also realized that in terms of cruises I only have 4 left!! Or course, some of them are pretty darn long, but it'll fly by, I think.

1) 14 day NZ (starts today!!)

2) 12 day South Pacific and Fiji

3) First half Circumnav, Sydney to Perth

4) Second half Circumnav - Perth, Tas, and NZ then back to Sydney.

then, DONE!! Mom and Dad, I miss you and I wanna come home!! :-)