Today was the day when our amazing round trip through New Zealand ended. And surely a memorable one. We've laughed, sometimes cried (in the process of defeating certain fears and when people steal our food. Not nice.), we've cleaned toilets and we've enjoyed every second of our first trip to New Zealand. Definitely recommended to all you people out there who deep in your hearts really want to go there but just can't do it. You're all welcome to join me on my future working holiday:)

There's so much to tell from these three weeks, so if you don't have the time to read all of it, now is the time to leave.

Auckland was our very first stop before our bus passes on the Kiwi Experience started, and we both agree that it is definitely the nicest big city we've been to (and we've been to quite a few of them). This was just a pit stop really before heading up to Paihi, the Bay of Islands, and having an urge to kill some time during these two days we hopped on the Kiwi van for free sightseeing around town, starting with bungy jumping for those who were interested. This was when Kaja swore on her life that she would never ever be so insane as to voluntarily jump off a bridge. (The story is to be continued..)

A little explenation of what the Kiwi bus pass really is. You basically jump on and off the bus and your bus driver advises you of what to do at the different places AND you get Kiwi discounts. The downside on the other hand is that you only stay 1-2 nights in every place (if you're tight on time that is). But then again you travel with the same people for about 2-3 weeks if you follow the itinerary and you stop in towns/lakes you would never go and see on your own. So yes Kiwi Experience is pretty cool. And the bus drivers buy you drinks. (When they get drunk enough, which is pretty often.)

Anyways, Paihia is a beautiful (especially in the summer time) little town up north on the north island and after 15minutes of hardcore discussions of what Sailing trip we should go on (they were all the same price and included the same stuff) we finally settled down for She's a Lady, while being asked if we had been travelling together for a long time. Yes it's become pretty obvious after 3months. The sailing trip was just plain awesomeness. The captain took us to a beautiful island where we did some kayaking, hiking and had lunch. Both on the way there and back we saw heaps of dolphins playing around the boat and it was really cool watching them.

I'll just mention all the places we've been to over these past three weeks as it just takes too much of an effort telling you all the details from every place. So in the right order (later you can look it up on the internet!): Paihia, Auckland, Mercury Bay, Rotorua, Waitomo, Taupo, River Valley, Wellington, Nelson, Westport, Lake Manipua (the Poo bar), Franz Josef, Wanaka, Queenstown.

Then the things worth mentioning. Well for one thing we did a 15,000ft skydive which was f***ing AWESOME! So you're probably thinking; Why on earth would anyone want to thrown themselves out of a plane?!? Just for the pure fact that there's nothing like the feeling you get when you sit on the edge of that plane and you're thinking what the hell am I doing and suddenly this idiot who's strapped on to your back pushes you out and you go WOOOOOOOW! All of a sudden you're upside down and the only thing you can see is the bottom of the plane, then you're facing the ground as you keep falling and on the DVD you of course ordered you look like the Catwoman, with your face drawn back. Oh yeah. This we did in Taupo, which is the cheapest option and the senery is not as nice as anywhere else but who thinks about that the first time they jump out of a plane? While we were on it T figured she just might as well do the bungy too. She got dipped all the way down to her ankles in freaking cold water but apparently it was so worth it freezing your ass off that she offered to do a tandem jump with me. No thank you very much.

So the next thing we did was black water rafting in Waitomo, which apparently is the only place you can do it. So we did it. It's nothing like rafting, honestly. We paddled around 50m under ground in 8 degress water and watched the "glow worms", which aren't really glow worms. They just lie in the ads. 4hours in a cave wearing a stinking wet suit does something to you and tomato soup has never before tasted so good. It's also worth mentioning Easter Day. Which was the day we got weird looks from our fellow bus riders. They had never heard about the egg hunting tradition. Yes of course we went through with it. They were well hidden in the bushes too. And yes we're easy to please, it made our day.

Next thing on the program was white water rafting in River Valley. Which is really just a river with a lodge next to it. Of course it hadn't rained enough when we arrived so the option was kayaking. But it's not the same thing so basically we stayed one night freezing our arses off as those greedy b******s didn't want to give us duvets for free. But the lodge was nice and the people on our bus were really cool so it's all good:)

In Wellington we managed to do some more couchsurfing with some really cool girls. We stayed there for two nights; they gave us our own key (their first time hosting so that was pretty cool) and we had fish 'n chips:D

Lake Manipua might have been the most interesting stop. The hostel was placed right next to the road and the only thing to see was an apparently beautiful lake, hence the name, and we played football on the beach. At night we had a costume party where we had to dress up as something starting with the same letter as your name. One can only imagine what people came as. Everything from Minnie and Mickey Mouse to a troll (T-bird of course!) and last but not least, the Beautiful Box- our second and last bus driver Brent, also known as Ponsey. A pretty chilly night was spent as the owner there too didn't hand out duvets for free.

Franz Josef was our next stop and was where all the activities on the glaciers took place. It was quite expensive so we just settled down with the fact that we can walk on the glaciers for free in Norway as I'm sure our mums will be happy to take us:) Instead we did 5hours of housekeeping in change for free accommodation, a $20 meal and two house drinks. A pretty good deal seeing as NZ is in fact really expensive. And we had the chance to keep ourselves updated on the housekeeping front as I'm sure we won't get away with it when we go home. So no worries there ladies, we're ready:)

We had bought a Base card, which allowed us to stay 5nights in the Base Backpacker hostels all around NZ. Base is filthy and unfriendly. Don't do it. We did it though and the only reason Wanaka was our fav was because it was brand new and they had karaoke night! We warmed up with some rugby (Kaja backed out after having "pain" in her knee, really the girls never got the ball as the guys don't think we can throw a ball. FYI we can.) and then it was time for the big night out, which we'd been looking forward to for the whole day. After all, we are the karaoke queens. We didn't win the bar tab but we had so much fun and everyone thought we should of. Honestly, no lies.

Queenstown was something we were looking forward to. It's the capital of activities in NZ and the only place where we would stay more than two nights. We stayed three:P It was also our last days with our bus so the first night we all went out with the bus driver while at the same time meeting up with our previous one. That was a blast. Lots of good pics to prove it too. So, to continue the bungy story. The first night got a little bit out of control as the World Bar had 100 drinks to hand out to everyone who asked if they could have a job there. We got about 3 free drinks each+ lots of lots of beer. So in a weak moment I managed to promise T-bird I would do the bungy jump. The day before we'd been watching people jump at the original bungy site on our way to Q-town, and deep deep, and I mean real deep down I wanted to do it. I just couldn't be any worse than T while at the same time EVERYONE kept telling me I just "had to do it". So I did it. It was horrible and I'm definitely doing it again! Holy cow what a kick! I was so prepared to do it that standing on the bridge looking down was no problem anymore. For those who don't know: I'm terrified of heights. Not to the extent as many others I've now met, but I'm scared. So scared that when doing the Lares Trek in Peru and walking up a steep hill I started to panick when I looked down. Everything went fine however until I was standing on the edge, looking down into the river underneath us. That's when I started panicking and hadn't I already payed s*** loads of money to do this insane thing (bungy is such a rip-off) I'm sure I would have turned around. I had trouble breathing and I don't think I've ever pushed myself that much to do something I was terrified of doing. You've never seen a pig scream until you've seen me bungy jump. Yes, I've got it all on tape:) The best part has to be when I was in the little rubber boat undoing the towel round my feet and I realized what I'd done. It's undescribable but now I know what people mean when they say that it's something you just have to do. Cause it is kind of awesome.

Enough about me and more about Q-town: They have a gondola skyline, which we thought was too expensive to do (like everything else here in NZ) but the view was meant to be amazing and what we wouldn't do for a good kodak moment. So we hit the walking track. My idea btw. After 45min walking uphill we reached the top and the view was amazing. People can just prepare themselves for the amazing slide show I'll be setting up when we get back home:) That was our last day and so at night we decided we just wanted to hang out with a group of English people we'd been on the same bus as since day 1. So first we won the "best name" prize in the quizzie competition downstairs in the bar. Did you know that a pig's orgasm lasts for 30min? Or that women's farts smell worse than men's? Or that Ringo Starr is the oldest member of the Beatles? God, my head is just bursting with knowledge at the moment. The prize was shots. Convenient as we had decided not to drink that night. After 4 shots however we decided to hit the sofas for a good ol' movie.

Now we're sitting here in sunny Melbourne in my future home. How convinient that they're selling the place. The woman we're staying with is an Australian T met on "Hurtigruta" and she's just absolutely fantastic. She made us lunch, which we had outside on the terrace in the sun (which is quite warm even though it is winter) and tonight we're doing a BBQ and her son is taking us on a good night out on the town. This is better than a 5 star hotel. Later suckers