Eden Garden

Yesterday morning the skies were a very dark grey. I packed by bag with a raincoat and my BSU jacket. I headed up the street with a cool breeze in face. It was perfect walking weather, particularly when wearing jeans and a T-shirt (rather than the thin, cool pants I've been needing to wear). I arrived at Eden gardens at 9am. Thanks to a city map I'd been given by a German girl from my hostel, I had no problems finding the place again. The gates were open, but the volunteer squad wasn't there yet. So I wondered around, exploring and taking pictures.

Eden Gardens is a great name for this place. Obviously it's named for being at the base of Mt Eden, but it really could be a miniature garden of eden. The 5.5 acres used to be an ugly old quarry, but today it has paths and sculptures draped in foliage. The paths criss cross everywhere, so I'm not sure I've fully explored the place. I made my way to the top of the garden and was treated to a fantastic view of the city and lush garden. Mt Eden was just behind me bit further up. Unfortunately, improper drainage from the mountain caused a slide that closed the loop path back down the mountain. So, after sighting my volunteer leader in my camera, I headed back the way I came. I did not run, as the dead leaves on the ground and the damp paths could have left me with a few extra bruises, but I didn't dally with picture taking either.

Soon, I had met up with the 3 ladies I had worked with last week - Diane, Julie, and Natalie. We occupied ourselves until Jeff showed up with a truck load of soil and then we started the mass potting of tulip bulbs. It really is much easier work than back home. Since we are putting bulbs in a pot with soil from a truck, we don't need to kneel on the ground digging hole after hole. Of course, they will have to dig many, many trenches to plant the pots in this week!

Again, we broke up the work with a morning tea accompanied by biscuits (crackers) and homemade fruit chutney (very interesting stuff - goes great with the NZ cheese they served). It took us another couple hours to finish potting the thousand plus bulbs and use the entire the truck bed of soil. We were then treated to lunch. I went with salmon and asparagus quiche (excellent) this time, which I'm glad off. I'm sure the pumpkin soup was lovely, but a little to odd sounding for me. Diane gave me here address and phone number so that I could put here down as a reference on applications. I very much appreciate this, as I all my other contacts are in the states. I also have a letter of recommendation I can provide with my applications.

Despite the black clouds that greeted the morning, it never did rain. It wasn't near as warm as the past few days, a stiff breeze kept the sunshine from getting my back to warm and the many clouds made me glad I had a jacket to wear during lunch. All the women agreed that even the locals can't predict Auckland's weather, they all expected rain also.

I concluded my last major business item last night. I bought a mobile phone (pronounced mobe-eye-el). It's pretty much going to be used for potential employers to get hold of me. I'm not really giving out the number, as it costs NZ$0.89 per minute - that's within NZ and to the US! The beauty part is that I don't have a contract. I just call in and "top up" minutes on the SIM card, and I'm good to go. I did use it once last night, set up a time to meet a local woman for coffee this evening. I'm really looking forward to that.

Today, I move hostels. I repacked so that all my stuff is in my backpack. I still have to figure out how I'm going to carry my laptop/messenger bag with the pack. I'm a little nervous about the walk across town, I really don't want to find out what poor shape I'm in. The upside is that my bag does have several things in it which are unnecessary, and therefore slightly heavier than when what it will be for tramping. The down side is, that gear probably weighs less than the tent and food I'd be travelling with. I am slightly disappointed to still be in Auckland, as I had planned to be moving up the north coast, but I definitely need the time to get my hiking legs back. This hilly town should be perfect for that purpose.