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July 12, 2016
Arrival
My flight from Melbourne airport was delayed, but luckily my stop over in Auckland was really long. While I received my boarding pass for departing Melbourne, I didn’t get one for Auckland and because it was just a transfer I had about 5-6 hours t...
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July 13, 2016
Day 1 - Sleep and Struggle
Today I slept in until 3pm! I was exhausted! It’s all catching up with me. Every time I woke up the soothing sound of the rain outside would put me back to sleep. I ended up staying in bed for quite a while and started reading the material in the ...
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July 14, 2016
Day 2 - Avarua
I got up at a more reasonable time this morning and realised I never went back to the office to sort out my booking (by the time I was up yesterday, the office was closed). The two ladies in the office made joking comments about how long I had sle...
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July 15, 2016
Day 3 - Muri
Made bacon and eggs for breakfast, so good! I ended up buying a bunch of items I don’t usually buy back at home, bacon, bread and burger rings were a nice holiday treat. After breakfast, I went for a walk to checkout the beach, it took about 10 s...
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July 16, 2016
Day 4 - Cultural Show
Today was exam day! I rode down to the police station to do the motorcycle test. They explained that there was a written text and a practical test, walked me into the middle of the station where there was a table and chairs, gave me the test and l...
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July 17, 2016
Day 5 - Avarua Market and SUP at Muri
I woke up early to be at the police station at 8:30am to re-sit my motocycle test and this time I passed! Woohoo! The practical test was next and gets you to go around cones, but they are quite close together which means you have to go fairly slow...
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July 18, 2016
Day 6 - Garden Photography and Night Market
This morning I made bacon and eggs again for breakfast and had a fairly quiet, relaxed morning. I was eating out the front of the villa and admiring the garden bed outside my room so I thought I’d take some photos, this made me want to do more pho...
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July 19, 2016
Day 7 - Intro to Scuba Diving
Every Tuesday at 1:30pm a person from “The Dive Center” comes to the hotel to offer a free scuba diving lesson in the hotel pool, so knowing this I slept in until about 11am before getting up and cooking up the last of the bacon for breakfast. It...
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July 20, 2016
Day 8 - Captain Tama's Lagoon Cruies
Today I going to join Captain Tama’s Lagoon Tour Cruise! As part of the tour, a tour bus was coming to pick us all up from our hotels. The bus driver was pretty funny, he was cracking jokes the whole way. He was telling us about a tourist that was...
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July 21, 2016
Day 9 - Lagoon Scuba Dive
Today I was booked in for my next scuba dive, except this time I was going out into the lagoon instead of just in the hotel pool. I went down to The Dive Center at about 9am and got fitted for flippers and a wetsuit. There was a small group of us ...
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July 22, 2016
Day 10 - Buggy Ride, Kayaking and Games
I was woken up sometime between 1:30am and 2:30am this morning by someone shouting at the top of their lungs. It turns out there were some partbus goers making some noise, which I didn’t actually hear but one of the other guests at the hotel was s...
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July 23, 2016
Day 11 - Kite Surfing and Party Bus
I’m quite positive my kite surfing lesson today was booked for 12 but I received a phone call in the morning where they told me they were expecting me to be there at 9! After a little confusion they booked me in for later in the day and it all wor...
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July 24, 2016
Day 12 - Rain, but no wind
After getting in pretty late last night, I slept in a bit. Today I planned to go for my second kite surfing lesson. This time I was going to learn how to self launch the kite instead of having someone help me do an assisted launch and also try wit...
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July 24, 2016
Day 13 - Just Chillin
I had yogurt and fruit for breakfast this morning and then bandaided my heels so I could ride over to the waterfall to take some photos. I made it through the mud ok, I’m an expert now! When I got there, the first thing I did was put mosquito repe...
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July 25, 2016
Day 14 - Farewell
Today was my last day in this paradise island! I was reflecting on what an amazing trip this has been and I am already thinking about the next time I can come back here, maybe for a kite surfing trip! Before I leave this place, I wanted to get one...
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July 26, 2016
Addendum
This trip has been everything I could have wanted and more. When I was planning it, I had some goals: Relax! The main purpose of this trip was to de-stress. Do something new and outside my comfort zone. Work on my extroversion - talk to ev...