What can I say? New Zealand is absolutely breathtaking incredible stupendous foreign goodness. Today is our last day here (we leave tomorrow for Oz) and I truly do not want to leave.

It's been the best vacation ever. It's hard to sum everything up in a short entry. I have been keeping a real paper and pen diary here and filled 4 solid pages just writing about two days!

We have been living like royalty here because the American dollar is so strong. We've been staying at high end inns. The food is incredibly cheap. We ate a big lunch today for only $4 US each. Most rates are about half what we'd pay in the States.

So, since M is ready to go, here's a quick cliff notes version of our trip so far:

*Spent 2 days exploring Auckland and Devonport. Experienced the incredible museum of Auckland Domain. Traipsed through Victoria Park and the University of Auckland. Bought some delicious NZ wine and drank it on a mountain overlooking Devonport and Auckland.

*Went to Waitomo Caves and took a cave boat tour to see the glow worms. Fascinating!

*Went to Rotorua resort/geyser region and saw lots of geysers, bubbling mud pools, and two real live kiwi birds!

*Experienced Hot Water Beach today. We dug a hole in the sand to form our own hot tub. We enjoyed it so much we both got burnt so badly we now look like lobsters! Ouch. *sniff*

Time to go. I'll write more... as soon as I can. I'm afraid I'm going to forget everything. This entire experience is like information overload.

Bye bye!