So I had my very last day of regular uni on Friday. Reviews for my three upcoming exams, so it doesn’t really feel as if I’ll never sit in a lecture theatre again. And exam preparation is what this week should be all about – however, so far I haven’t even started yet.
Mostly for good reasons, like going on two daytrips with friends on Saturday and Sunday, but today I must admit to just feeling somewhat crappy and utterly exhausted and therefore not doing much. Not sure whether that’s because of a flu or because my SAD is starting to show – I’ve been having some trouble sleeping the past week, which usually is one of the first obvious warning signs for me. Just in case I picked up St. John’s Wort capsules today.
But on to more cheerful news: Saturday’s excursion to Kaitoke Regional Park with Alana and Rachel from my church was altogether lovely. First we had lunch in Petone, in a café called ‘The Screaming Turtle’, then we drove on to the park. It was chilly but sunny, and a bridal party was taking wedding pictures around the scenic creek. We walked around for a bit, checking out the area where they filmed part of Rivendell for the Lord of the Rings movies and enjoying the beautiful native forest with its fern and rimu trees.
On Sunday Rathy, her friend Michelle and I went for lunch in a restaurant right at Evans Bay and then drove to Owhiro Bay on the south coast, from where we walked along the beach to the Red Rocks and Sinclair Head seal colony. There were quite a lot of male New Zealand fur seals there, mostly enjoying a lazy sunbath. It’s quite amazing to be only a few minutes outside of Wellington and feel as if you’re in the middle of nowhere… The weather was really nice again, and we could even see the snow-capped mountains on the South Island in the distance!
> More photos from both days can be found in my Flickr album.