Finally a new blog update! My holidays in Sydney and New Zealand are flying by and I now have just 12 days left here.

I flew from Perth to Sydney on the 26th of November and had 4 days there. Went to Manly Beach with my friend Lisa-Maria from Austria on the first day and after that we had rain the rest of the days. Despite the rain I managed to see a few new things and I was happy to be back there. One of the highlights was a stand-up show with American comedian Wayne Brady. During the last days I also met up with Therese (SWE), Cedric (MAU), Malin (SWE) and Verena (AUT).

I have spent December in New Zealand. I started in Auckland where I met up with Nico (NZ), who I met first during my stay at UBC in Vancouver. It was great to see him again and he showed me around the city with a trip to Skytower for an amazing view and also a trip to Rangitoto Island in the bay - a dormant volcano. I also got to go on an amazing dolphin cruise on my own, where we saw hundreds of dolphins both common and bottlenosed ones.

After Auckland I have been on my own. First stop was Rotorua - a town in an area famous for its thermal pools. It was very interesting to see. In Rotorua I also went up the mountain nearby with a gondola to try "luging" which is go-karting/tobogganning down a race track on the mountain - a lot of fun! I also had a quick visit to a wildlife park learning more about the kiwi bird.

After Rotorua I had a 7 hour busdrive to Wellington, the capital of NZ. The bad weather from Sydney returned and it resulted in me getting a cold - I guess going from 36C in Perth to 20C in NZ was too much. 3 days in Wellington were spent hanging out with 2 Swedish guys, going to Te Papa (the national museum), visiting the WETA cave (souvenir shop/museum for the company doing special effects on Lord of the rings, Avatar and many many other big movies from the last decade), a cable car ride to the botanical gardens and finally a quick stop at the parliament, referred to as the beehive.

From Wellington I took the ferry across to the South Island and drove with a bus to fabolous Kaikoura along the most beautiful coastal road I have ever been on. Along the way I saw lots of seals and a colony of penguins.In Kaikoura I went on a 10 km walk with a German guy from my hostel to a seal colony - also very nice.

This morning I went whale watching off the coast of Kaikoura and saw 2 large sperm whales (kaskelothvaler) splashing around. And after the longest and worst bus drive in a while I am now in Christchurch where I have checked in to a rather crappy hostel... Good news is that I just bumped in another friend from back home :)

The day after tomorrow I will start my 1-week tour from Christchurch with my German friend Soren (who was on the tour of the Australian Westcoast), so that should be a lot of fun!

Hope you're all enjoying the Christmas preparations and the snow... not much of neither here...

Cheers!
Michael

Since I dont have time to upload photos here when I am on the road, hopefully you can access these albums on Facebook.

Pictures from Sydney:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=336827&id=508888661&l=250f5f68be

Pictures from Auckland: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=337552&id=508888661&l=5d91c1ee27 Pictures from Rotorua and Wellington: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=339137&id=508888661&l=6b2b041d3a

Pictures from Kaikoura and Christchurch: