Wellington

---

Being the only American Spicer in NZ, I 'raced' down to Wellington via a twelve hour bus trip and stayed in the nicest hostel I have found, the YHA. Halloween out with Galen, who I hadn't seen in fifteen years was a great time. He put me up for a few days while I explored Wellington, the numerous harbours, steep 'hills', the local art museums and Te Papa - the best national mueseum I have come across - which was actually free. The City Art Gallery was chalked full of Yusama's dot works, which to say the least were bizzarely interesting.

On a budget I sought out an organic farm to live on for the next few weeks. After sending out emails to a few, including (by accident) an 'Au Natural' - nudist farm, I managed to find a great family with modest gardens, chickens, ducks and free-range guinea pigs. Traveling for this long with different beds almost nightly to more foreign accents than imaginable you start to yearn for something familar. On a plethora of occasions I have fooled myself into seeing a familar face in a kiwi's colorful countenance. The last few weeks of WWOOFing at the Adam's petite estate have been a treat with almost all the comforts of home. Random tasks to earn my keep ranged from weeding, building various garden walls, installing a sink/shelves and many concrete creations such as the duck pond. Always up for trying something new, the Adams and fellow woofers Jackie and Mortiz created a few cooking experiemcnets such as garlic cheddar bread (a copy of Great Harvest's), mulitple baches of Quark (german cheese spread-imagine sour cream/cream cheese mixed) and many other bread concoctions.

Elaine, Jackie (a Au-Pair and WWOOFer, respectively) and I jumped on a boat to the Department of Converservation Reserve on Somes Island, in the Wellington Harbour. Plenty of birds, skinks, sheep to go around not to mention incredible sights of the hillsides all around. Most of the rest of the time down there included a fishing adventure with Mortiz and plenty of jogging to keep the khankles shapely (you run even further than expected when you get lost in a new town). After an exhausting and ulitimately pointless search for All-Whites tickets, I met fellow American Will out for what turned out to be the liveliest night out on the town Wellington has seen any many years. We celebrated the NZ's second ever entry to the World Cup by adourning ourselves in milky capes and giving more high fives than Mike O'Mally through all tree years of Nickelodeon GUTS.

---