LIFE IN NEW ZEALAND

As you may know we are in New Zealand (NZ), and we have been here for about a week and a day plus the flight here that took a few days. We first arrived in Wellington which is a city at the bottom of the North Island. We stayed there for a few days, which was fun. We went to the Te Papa Museum, which is one of the larger museums in NZ. The warf or harbor, was fun to walk along in wellington, and we played on this slide that was designed to look like a lighthouse. It was extremely fun to play on. I wish we could have a slide like that at EWU's chidrens center, but licensing would say 'no way, no how, it's not safe'. On Saturday we left Wellington and drove up north to a town called Taumaruni. The drive was very nice. Paul drove. He did a good job at driving on the Left side of the raod sitting on the right side of the car. We went to church there the next morning and met some really awesome people. We ended up being invited to eat lunch at their home, which was really good. It was nice to be around good friendly people. Sunday afternoon we drove on up to a city called Hamilton, which was a nice place, and bigger than Taumaruni. We stopped at the LDS Temple and saw the Christmas lights and took a tour of their visitors center, which was very nice. On monday we drove to a place called Bridal Veil Falls, which is a beautiful waterfall next to Raglan, NZ. We hiked to the top and took pictures and then we hiked to the bottom of the falls and took pictures. The hike back up the hill was hard work and made my legs super tired. It was a killer of a hike for someone as out of shape as I am. After visiting the Falls we drove up to Auckland, and on Tuesday we returned the free rental car we were relocating to the airport. We went to the Auckland Zoo and check out the animals here. We got to feed some birds and see and elephant get a bath, and stand about three feet away from a giraffe's head while he was eating. It was great fun. So now we are haning out in Auckland at the YMCA. We went to the Antartic Underwater exhibition that they have here Called Kelly Tarltons. It was fun. We got to see penguins, sting rays, sharks, crabs, seahorses, and other cool things.

Bon Voyage!

The journey begins in just a few short days. I look forward to the fun and the sun. The adventures of the Michie's in New Zealand will be great and hopefully stress free.

We are headed to New Zealand for a three month vacation! We are totally stoked! The plane ride is going to be extremely long but it will be worth it. So everyone asks "why New Zealand?" Well here is the story ( of course this story has two sides or two versions ) anyway here goes.... When Paul was dating Christine he asked her "If you could go anywhere in the world where would you go?". Christine said New Zealand (because she heard is was a nice place and very beautiful at that, she also thought going to an island on the otherside of the world would be fasinating.). So Paul started thinking because he loves to think and plan and scheme. He thought to himself 'hey I have some friends that just came back from New Zealand and they have been telling me awesome things about it and they recommend traveling there. When Paul starts thinking and letting the wheels turn in his head there is no way to know what will happen in the end but you try to stop the wheels and ....well lets just say it is hard to do and not something to be recommended. :) The plans to New Zealand began when Christine and Paul were just dating....not even close to the whole engagement stage of their life. Once engaged and then Married happily ever after the trip to New Zealand was put into overdrive and money started to pile up in the wonderful savings account ( not really but that would have been totally awesome it it had happened like that). This magic savings account that we couldn't touch except to add to, grew and grew. Days went by then weeks and suddenly Months were flying by. All of a sudden we needed to get our plane tickets... and start planning our wonderful vacation. There is a catch to this beautifully schemed vacation and it is called "WORK"....oh, no, not our current jobs in the USA, they are happy to have us go as long as we promise we will come back to them, which we were more than happy to agree with,.... it is 'Work' in New Zealand we must find glamorous jobs such as picking fruit, relocating cars, resort custodians, etc. This minor catch won't be bad, it will just add to our fun cultural experience in New Zealand that we are looking forward to. So IF Paul and Christine are never heard from again it is because they have already escaped to the wonderful land of New Zealand.