An itinerary of sorts

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Hello

In case you were wondering what the next plan is and to give you all a vague idea of my location(s) for the next four to five months, I thought I'd post another blog.

So on the 12th of May Sarah and I will fly to Shanghai, China. We will spend 3 nights in Shanghai before flying to Beijing where we will start an Intrepid journey of the Silk road (). The tour covers 4,000km across the breath of China, from Beijing, to the mountains of Tian Chi, camel riding in the Taklimakan desert and concluding in Kashgar, right on the western side of China. We will be seeing the Great Wall and the Terracotta warriors among a zillion other things. Travel by train, bus (both private and local) and boat. At the end of the tour we fly back to Beijing, and then fly in to Frankfurt on the 11th of June.

Sarah and I have about seven weeks to fill in Europe. We are planning to tour of Eastern Europe with Intrepid again, visiting Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and Turkey () probably on the 22nd of June through to the 13th of July. The rest of the time will probably be spent visiting people, Anna in Zurich, Philippe in Belgium, Sarah's uncle in Italy and her cousin in Germany and I hopefully will be able to have a reunion with my Alaskan tour group and Emily. We're hoping to squeeze in a couple of other European cities like Prague and Vienna somewhere along the way. I'm sure I have room to see others too, so if you’re about then please let me know.

So after Europe we fly into New York on the 31st of July and then trek our way into Canada. Sarah can work, I am unable to, as my visa has expired and you can only get it once (although I'm trying to figure out whether I could get another working holiday visa through the Australian system - dual citizenship must have its uses). Not sure what the plan for Canada is as yet. Newfoundland is high on the list, I'm looking into conservation volunteer work, or perhaps WOOFFING (volunteer work on organic farms). The Yukon is the other place I would love to visit, although there is a slight logistical problem with both places I want to visit being on opposite ends of the country! I would also love to catch up with my Canadian friends too.

I'm planning to be back in NZ in about late September or October. Completely missing the New Zealand winter 😊


Right now, I'm back working with Greater Wellington Regional Council with the Parks division at the Upper Hutt base. I'm working on their GIS data base, five minute bird count and ungulate browse data bases and should be heading out into the field later this week to help out with the Rata photo point survey. Last weekend was spent on Mana Island (just north west of Wellington city) on a weeding and tree planting trip. Mana is home to a few rare or endangered species such as the takahe, giant weta, shore plover, robins, blue penguins and duvacels gecko. Some of which were very happy to pose for a few photos.

Hope to see you all soon

Cielle

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Photos

Takahe
These guys were thought to be extinct, until a small population was discovered in the Murchinson Mountains. Population is still below 300 birds.

Trapdoor spider
These things give nasty bites. Not poisoness, it just hurts.

Pretend gannets
In an attempt to attract gannets to nest on the Island, concrete gannets along with sound recordings of a gannet colony was placed on the island. 10 years later, still no gannets.