Oh Time, Where Have Thou Gone?

Hello readers!

So I apologize for not blogging in a week... or two.  I swear the time here goes by about 2x as fast as it does at home.  It's absolutely crazy!  I just wanted to inform you all of that.  So please don't be mad at me.  I've been super busy. 

Two weekends ago, April 1 and 2, myself and four other friends took a bus up to Lake Taupo.  We headed out Friday morning and got there in the afternoon.  We stopped at this cute restaurant called the Gumboot Manor for lunch.  Our orders looked a little something like this...

The food was absolutely delicious.  I got "one piece of fish and chips" expecting a light meal.  Oh no.  That piece of fish was half the size of the plate.  A full size dinner plate.  And the chips (fries) were falling off the other side.  It was some of the best fish I've had here.  And I've had quite a lot.  So after finishing our bus ride and getting to Taupo, we checked in to our hostel and then wandered the area.

Great place to sleep for cheap!

Not only is this a McDonald's plane, it's actually part of the playplace.  No Joke.  Best playplace ever.

We even managed to find the lake.

Alright.  So the real reason we trekked 5 hours by bus up to Lake Taupo wasn't to check out it's ski-town/water town persona.  Nope, we went to skydive.  Our dive was planned for 9:20 on Saturday morning.  Or that's when we were going to be picked up anyways.  We had to place a confirmation call 20 minutes before pickup to confirm the ride and to make sure the weather was good.  Well we called.  And we were told that the weather was not good.  So Tony sprang from bed and ran to the window and ripped back the curtain.  When, what to his wondering eyes should appear?  But a miniature sleigh and eight tiny reindeer!  Oh wait, wrong story, sorry.  No, he saw clouds.  Nice grey clouds across the entire sky.  Damn it, Taupo!

So we calmly rescheduled our dive for an 11:30 pickup since we had to catch the bus back at 2.  In the meantime we headed to the pub for their advertised "All Day Brekky"

Mmm... tasty.

After stuffing ourselves we headed back to the hostel to be picked up.  As we were sitting there, getting excited again, it started raining.  Yes, raining.  So we called.  And we had to cancel.  Let's just say that disappointment isn't exactly a strong enough word.  But we bucked up and decided to explore more of the city, do the tourist thing and all that, which was fun.  Not even close to what we planned but fun none the less. 

After a 5 hour resigned bus ride back to Palmy it was time to get excited again.  This time for a birthday!  Yay!  It was our friend Stephanie's birthday and it was time to par-tay.

Obligatory group photo (take 1, they did get better, this one is just my favorite)...

And that basically ends the first weekend of April.  Oh, there was a Res Halls rugby tournament.  Miro placed 4th.  Go Miro!!

You can go ahead and expect another brief blog within the next few days about this past weekend, April 8-10.  After that, however, the blogging will be postponed for about two weeks.  We're going on Mid-Semester Break!!  Get ready South Island, you've got 7 crazy Americans and one outnumbered Kiwi headed your way.