A Weekend in Auckland

Logan had the idea that we should go backpacking in Auckland for the weekend, and so we did :)  The two of us and our other three friends caught the "Nakedbus" to Auckland on Friday evening. (No, fortunately you don't have to be naked to ride the bus.)  We didn't know where we would be staying or what types of things we wanted to do.  It was quite liberating!
The bus dropped us off in Auckland at about 8 that night.  We each brought a backpack with a few days worth of clothes, some brochures, and some snacks.  We had no idea where anything was, but we knew that we wanted to find some food.  We walked down the street and went into the nearest hotel and asked for places where we could find some food and a place to stay.  We ended up eating at a food court and it wasn't hard finding a place to stay.  We found a Backpackers hostel/motel right in the middle of the city, which charged us $25 a night.  We got two rooms and each room had a bunkbed, so they brought up another mattress for us.
That night we didn't do much.  We walked around the city for a bit, and then went to bed at around 11, so we could get an early start the next day. We found out the hard way why the hostel was so cheap.  I practically froze to death that night because there were no heaters and the blankets were paper thin.  Also, the night life in Auckland doesn't start until about 1 in the morning, and when it starts, it is crazy! I woke up to people screaming and music blasting.  It was ... horrible, but a good experience, I guess.
On Saturday, we ate breakfast at Burgerking because we thought it was our safest bet for a pretty good quick meal.  Well, we weren't really satisfied.  The hot chocolate was very bland and the crossiants and breakfast sandwiches weren't too good either.
Our first stop was the Auckland museum.  We hopped on the bus, which charged us $10 for a whole day pass (unlimited hops on & off for the day.)  It took us to the museum, and since we're students, we got free admission.  The museum had 3 GIGANTIC floors with all different types of exhibits.  There were ocean exhibits, Maori culture, warfare, WWI&II, Oceania, and a whole bunch more.  We watched a Maori cultural performance for about half an hour.  They performed poi balls, stick game/dances, and of course the Haka.  It was amazing!

We walked around the museum for a couple hours, and then got back on the bus and stopped off at Parnell, which was a shopping/eating area.  We ate sushi for lunch, which was pretty good.
At about 4ish, we went over to Skycity, the home of the Skytower.  It was the tallest building in Auckland and probably New Zealand.  We went up to the topmost level, which was 722 feet high.  The actual tower extended much higher but we weren't able to go to the top.  We could walk around in a circle and see all of Auckland.  It was beautiful.  People were doing the "skyjump," which is where you jump off of the Skytower from about 700 ft up in the air.  It was soooooo crazy watching people practically fall from the sky.   We watched the sunset from the Skytower, which was gorgeous!
After the Skytower, we went back to the hostel to show and get ready to watch the All Blacks rugby game at one of the sports bars.  The All Blacks played South Africa, the previous Tri Nations Champs.  We ended up at a bar near the harbor.  The game was incredible! Rugby is HARDCORE.  Guys were getting thrown, kicked, punched, tackled, headbutted, EVERYTHING! By the end of the game, their white shorts were covered in blood.  It was so gross, but definitely worth watching! The All Blacks ended up winning, which was really exciting!
After the game, we were all pretty exhausted due to our lack of sleep the night before.  BUT, it was Logan's 21 birthday the next day, so I really wanted to do something fun.  We ended up going to the room and playing cards and resting for later on that night.  We went down to the gaming lounge/bar at about 11 and Logan played the slots.  He won $35! Happy birthday! haha.  The guy who was on the machine before him won $280!  It was a lucky night.
We got back to campus today about noon, and we start school tomorrow!  Wish us luck!


P.S. I posted pictures on facebook. Check it out!