It's been a while since I updated this so I thought I'd let you all know how I'm doing and add a few more pics to share (read; make you jealous).

So I got back from Tonga at the end of August feeling refreshed and looking forward to Curley's arrival and the start of the world cup. Curley(who I travelled to NZ with in 2005) arrived at the start of Sept and I'm fairly sure we just spent the first weekend chilling around Auckland and went out for a short walk in the Waitakeres.

The Waitakere mountains are to the west of Auckland and they are somewhere I've been for quite a few walks now! It's really stunning out there, it's only about half an hour from Auckland but it feels like you are out in the middle of nowhere, the scenery is stunning, beautiful natural forests with giant Kauri trees and the mountains run all the way to the sea so there is the option of going for a coastal mountain walk too! Auckland has a fairly bad reputation with Kiwis and travellers alike but there really is lots of outdoorsy stuff to do within short reach of the city and you get to be in a city with nice restaurants etc . too! Everyone's a winner!

So the following weekend was the long anticipated start of the rugby world cup! The opening ceremony started in the city centre - unfortunately there were about 200000 more people that then area could support - so after a lot of queuing and standing around we ended up watching the opening match at a friends flat - which was awesome because she has a roof terrace and we were able to watch the fireworks over the city!

That weekend was also Ireland's first game (against the USA in New Plymouth), so I hopped on a bus and headed down to meet Curley and watch the game! It was a decent win, followed by a lot of drinking, the world cup had well and truly kicked off. The following weekend was the momentous Ireland versus Australia! What a game, we had awesome seats and the atmosphere was electric when Ireland beat the Aussies! Needless to say a large quantity of beverages was also consumed that night too!!

The following weekend Rois, Curley and I headed to to National park to walk the Tongariro crossing, however the weather wasn't on our side so we just went for a shorter walk - which was nice, well the first half of the walk was nice, we got to see a cool waterfall. The second half of the walk was less impressive as we saw nothing due to rain/mist - ah well c'est la vie! The following day we headed up to Rotarua to watch Ireland beat the Russians - another enjoyable rugby world cup game. That week we also took in another rugby match in Auckland - we watched South Africa hammer Namibia at the north shore! It was great to see the springboks play - but it was also a little sad to see Namibia receive such a thrashing!

The following weekend Ireland were playing in the South Island against Italy so no rugby for us - until at the last minute my housemate offered me some tickets so I went with Roisin and Natalie to see Scotland's narrow loss to England. It was a great game though and again afterwards many beverages were consumed!

The following weekend was the quarter finals. Weeks before a group of us had booked a lodge in the Hawke's Bay region to go and relax/go white water rafting (a bit of a contradiction in terms). It was a long journey down on Friday after work but totally worth it, there were 5 of us and after a chilled out Friday night, (Natalie being the superstar she is cooked us dinner and we drank a small amount of wine) we were ready for our action packed Saturday. We headed out for a full day rafting and it was awesome. It was a grade 3 river - so relatively gentle but incredibly enjoyable. Other than a brief incident where I tried to kill myself by doing a back flip onto some rocks the day was AWESOME! We made it back to the lodge in time to paint our faces and go watch the first set of quarter finals - not our finest hour; we lost to the Welsh and were out of the world cup. It had been a great run up until then and although it was sad we did still enjoy the weekend very much.

A little tip if you are ever travelling around New Zealand - the roads a littered with little brown scenic viewpoint signs - if you have the time and are passing one stop - it is almost always worth it. On the way back up to Auckland we pulled in to see a beautiful waterfall, a hidden gem just off the highway! We also stopped briefly in Taupo to have an ice cream - it really was a fantastic weekend, great location, great activities and great company!!

I spent the next couple of weekends in Auckland watching the end of the rugby, probably drinking a bit, chilling out and possibly the odd visit out to the waitakeres for a walk. After the world cup finished I decided to detox - mainly to help save some money for my upcoming holiday to the south island! So I've still been enjoying life in Auckland, the weather has been changeable, things have certainly warmed up and there is the definite feeling that summer is coming and we seem to have regular glimpses of what summer will be but then we get a few days of rain - it's a little frustrating but I'm sure the good weather will be here to stay soon. Saying that we have managed to have a few BBQs already and I have been for a swim at the beach (after one of my walks in the waitakeres).

That basically sums up my time in Auckland between my 2 holidays - there was a lot of rugby, a fair bit of drinking, some nice walks, I also regularly went to a pub quiz, had some nice bbqs and of course still went to work!