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Published: September 28th 2008
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views of auckland from the sky tower (next 12 pics) okdoke, so after i wrote the last entry i went up the sky tower with karl (kate had already been up as she got here a few days before us) was the perfect day to go up as was clear blue skies and we could see for miles. auckland is very much a stretched out city that turns into towns (like where the volunteer house is, in a town called mount albert) very treed area aswell (thumbs up from me then :D) got some fab pics from the tower - ill be uploading pics later on, maybe next week or the week after...basically i forgot to bring the cable with me to the internet cafe.
mount albert (where the house is) seems to be a mainly chinese settled area as every shop is chinese, oh and theres tons of therapy places for massages - good to know! we dont generally do very much at the house, after work we tend to come in have a shower and crash infront of the tv. we got a bit hooked on NZgot talent the other night - ooo dear!
for the work this week we were based in and around aucklands reserves and parks
mainly weeding.
MON - first day of work! we went to an area (which i think was on the outside of a uni campus) called oakley creek which used to be a dumping ground for rubbish but the council worked hard to change it into a wildlife area. it was a pretty place and was the site of aucklands only natural waterfall - after the days work some of us walked home so we could see the rest of the area and the waterfall, beautiful, i will upload pics at some point i swear!! we were lopping privet down - weed that the english brought over and is in desperate need of destroying, so watch out when i get home, i may just be ripping down our privet hedge! we got some more volunteers in the house wanda 24 DC, meyuko 21 japan, phillipa 32 north west eng, peter germany maybe 19-20. heard a grey warbler all day - its call is really nice - and also saw a Takahe for the first time walking around the place (they're birds by the way).
TUES - went to mount eden - extinct volcano with veery steep sides on which
we were working - we weere weeding again, pulling out broom and privet, fun stuff as due to the steepness id be renching something out of the ground and then fall down the hill with the force of it being up-rooted! saw and listened to the Tui bird all day, beautiful shiny black bird about the size of a crow with a white throat. it has two vocal chords so can make two sounds at the same time - i thought i was listening to tons of birds but it was only one!! def my fav bird so far.
WEDS - went to aucklands largest wetland the waiatarua reserve in the morning. saw loads of Pukeko (blue and black bird with a red beak mix between a moorhen and a chicken) we were mulching around plants that a previous group had planted about 2 weeks ago (mulching is basically putting two wheelbarrow loads of decaying woodchip around the plants) was hard work (as everything has been so far) shovelling the chips into the barrow and taking it down to the plants in the sun. half day we moved to another site about 20mins drive away in a rough neighbourhood
(dave the council worker with us warned us that at about 3pm the naughty kids would be walking back from school - and that they did, they accused us of destroying their hiding place, from the police probably, and some of them asked if we were csi!) we were weeding again which consisted of pulling stinking iris out of the ground for the rest of the day - back breaking work as we didnt really wan to sit down on all the rubbish that the 'naughty kids' had thrown in there! got home and wanda - vegan - cooked me and kate dinner, niiiice, shes looked after us all week as she loves cooking :D fine by me! I SAW NEIGHBOURS TODAY at 5pm, yelled for kate, it was so exciting :D havnt seen it for aaaaaaaaaaaages due to the channel 5 fiasco 😞 didnt recognise half the cast and we are ahead of britains neighbours so i wont give anything away 😊
THURS - we were at the most beautiful site so far, Tahuna Torea wetland reserve, the locals had fought the council to make it a reserve instead of a rubbish tip, luckily they won 😊 we
were putting in posts for information signs all day. the signs are to tell members of the public a bit about the plant they are infront of (if ever you are in nz and around the auckland area, i recommend you go here) saw a Fantail today (bird a bit bigger than a sparrow with a beautiful tail that it fans out - hence the name) didnt have time to get my camera out but it sat in a tree infront of me for a little bit 😊 also saw several Pied Stilts, another beautiful bird, tall and sleek with red legs and this one is black and white. two of which (a mating pair) had 4 chicks - i managed to get photos of them - they had a high pitched squeaky alarm call, sound nicer than my description though! came across a Midden today aswell, tis an area where mauri about 500-600yrs ago came to eat their shellfish and just left the shells on the ground, went about 30cm deep!
FRI - destroying more privet today in meola reef reserve. very satisfying as it had created a dense bush and was taking over the area so native
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glass floors looking down on the streets below (can hold the weight of 4 baby elephants!! why measure the weight in baby elephants and also, did they put the elephants up there to test it?!?! what happened to the 5th one?!?!) plants coouldnt grow very easily and we pretty much cleared the area! we were cutting down big privet trees then rough mulching (cutting them up) them. tough work but fun all the same - i reckon that sums up all the week apart from the stinking iris lol. got back to the house packed up and moved on to the acb (auckland central backpackers) where we are staying this weekend. im in a small room with karl and richard, kate, linda and julia are next door. yuki's going home on monday sadly. me kate and karl went for pizza - couldnt be bothered to cook, had a mango chutney base to it! (thats the only reason why im telling you, its not very interesting otherwise!) then went to see the rocker at the cinema, got back, straight to bed, knackered! in fact a late night for us this week has been anything after 9pm!
SAT - didnt do much today, we are in auckland in the acb so did laundry, went to the cinema with yuki, karl, richard and kate to see journey to the centre of the earth, me, k and k went to starbucks for 2 hours
then to the imax to see eagle eye then home and bed...exciting stuff...
and so here we are to today, havnt done much yet, clocks went forward...
weather has been good all week, hot and sunny and a little bit of rain on saturday so good times 😊 sooooo tiiiired this week. next week im off to the very tip of auckland, looks beautiful, cant wait. i think thats it, sorry if ive bored you1
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