Submitted by Andrew Gorski on the 2024 Winter KAAP program in New Zealand…
Week 2 of our KAAP New Zealand Trip went by fast! Meeting new locals and continuing our time outdoors have made these days fly by. We are still transitioning to New Zealand culture and it has been a grand experience for all of us. We started the week on Monday with a visit to University of Otago’s Anatomy Museum. We were able to see the bodies of real humans that were self-donated to the museum for research. The museum had body parts that were plastinated, which meant the water and fat were replaced with plastic to reserve them for future studies. Some of the bodies have been there since the 1800s! Afterwards, we continued our tour of Dunedin by finishing up our scavenger hunt, and concluded with our presentations on Tuesday. It was inspiring to see everyone’s efforts come together to show the rest of the class.
Wednesday and Thursday was a 2-day overnight biking expedition. This was by far the highlight of our week. Altogether, it was a 67 kilometer bike ride. We stayed overnight at the Wedderburn cottages. The views of the canyon were nothing but extravagant. I have never seen anything like it before and it made this trip much more worth it. The sun would set at 10:00 pm which left an amazing display of sunlight fading away. Afterwards, we followed up our bike trip with a lesson in curling. Curling is one of the more popular sports in New Zealand and trying it out for the first time was difficult, but fun. We split up into our groups and tested out the ice!
On Friday, we set off on a Wildlife Tour to see the exotic animals this country has to offer. Some of the animals included the Albatross, the largest flying bird in the world. We also saw countless sea lions and penguins on the beach. The sea lions lived their best life soaking in the sun, and playing in the ocean. The penguins were more reserved as they stayed in their tiny huts. We concluded this awesome week with a nice, relaxing day at the beach on Saturday. A long day of hiking and biking was followed by swimming and boogie-boarding in the Pacific Ocean. It’s hard to believe it’s been two weeks already. (Submitted on January 14, 2024)