NEW ZEALAND!!!

Hello from the South Island of New Zealand!!!

John and I are having a blast. Won't be a long one because we're off to dinner shortly.

AMAZING time here so far and we've only had three days!

Arrived late tuesday night, picked up our camper van (a "spaceship" named R2D2 - coincidence, I think not!!), drove out to Lake Tekapo had an afternoon hike around Mount John (another coincidence!), made dinner in our campavan, chucked out and drove further south. Woke up in Queenstown where we roamed around in the morning and went horse back riding through a place called paradise where they filmed a load of Lord of the Rings scenes. It was absolutely break taking. Today we strolled through town and then went White water rafting in the afternoon - VERY COOL, and cold! Tonight dinner and a pub. Tomorrow we paraglide at 9am through the mountains of NZ (HOLY CRAP!!!), tomorrow afternoon a hike, and then we will head out of town and make our way further south toward Te Anu to get to Milford Sound. Rock up there on Sunday spend the day and then head out towards the glaciers north of here to have an afternoon glacier hike and then hit some hot springs.

How are we affording all this you ask?? Thank you mom and steph for the visa money card, and thanks muchly dad and doc for the cash in hand before leaving!! Also thanks to Nulsen Primary School for employing me in Esperance!!

We're having an amazing time! This may be the place for a future exchange!!!

Lots of love,

cristen :o) and John!

And we're off!!

Hey all!!!

So a term is over, wow that went quickly. Lots and lots has happened and we're having too much fun and too busy to write. So sorry. I will over the holidays at some point.

Breifly, we had some awesome Canadians here, invading Esperance during March, i FINALLY finished all my course work for Reading Part I (GOD LOVE your patience with me Kathleen!! I swear I'll be a better student for Part II!), and we've been planning our own adventures and my family (YEAH!!) have all booked tickets to get over here as well, so there have been lots of date sorting out phone calls the last little while.

My mom and sister arrive in early May! Very exciting and then my dad arrive mid-May for three weeks!! It will be a MONTH full of family!! Awesome.

John and I are off to Melbourne tomorrow for three nights, footy game, comedy show, shopping, tours of the city, easter lunch with Charby's family and loads more in Melbourne. Then we fly to Christchurch where we have rented a camper van for 12 nights and we are touring and tramping through the South Island!! SOO SO SO EXCITED. We're hopefully going whitewater rafting, hot air ballooning, hiking, swimming, hot springing, and we're going to hike the Fox Glacier, see penguins and whales and a whole lot more!!!

We'll keep you posted!

Love you all, and we'll send more from Melbourne and New Zealand! WOO HOO!!

Lots of love, cristen :o)