wanderlust

04/12 - 08/12 Another week of conservation work is over - the last of 5 weeks. A short summary of what we die this week in Wellington: we filled loooads of mulch into bags which we carried uphill, we did plant releasing and track maintaining in a Bird Sanctuary, more plant releasing, as-well as some work in Zealandia (see last post) and nursery work. To be honest, I am kind of glad that my time in the project is over because I discovered that construction work and gardening is not really one of my passions. Though, I finish this project and leave New Zealand with a smiling face. Just like all the other countries I've been to, New Zealand changed me and my mind. I learned so much, not just about native plants and animals, but about kindness, generosity and how everything seems to be connected in a deep love for our nature. In many ways, I hold a different stance about who I want to be as a person and how I want to live my life. Looking back, what fascinated me

27/11 - 03/12                 the heaviest insect in the world                             in Zealandia On Monday morning, I rejoin the Conservation Volunteers after a pretty strenious walk uphill to the historic Truby King house with a fantastic view over the bay and airport, my home for the following weeks. This week's tasks were: potting plants in the nursery, plant releasing in nature reserves, weeding, beach cleaning and cutting down plants in Zealandia. Zealandia is a great eco sanctuary which depicts NZ's native nature - this park is actually of paramount importance to the conservation work in NZ. The native plants, birds, reptiles etc. are threatened by invasive species (the Europeans and immigrants brought  many plants and over all mammals - there were no mammals at all in NZ a couple of centuries ago) that endanger indigenous species and already made many of them extinct. The goal of Zealandia is therefore to recreate a natural and predator-free

20/11 - 26/11 I have 5 weeks of volunteering with Conservation Volunteers in total of which I spent my third week in Titirangi, a suburb of Auckland. This time, my new team and I had to fulfill some different tasks: we do a lot of weeding in a historic garden, renewed the stairs of a coastal walking track at Piha beach, planted trees along a stream and cut down or pulled out thousands of invasive trees (a fern species from Australia) while climbing in a cliff-like mountain. On Friday, my team and I went out for dinner and had the best and fanciest vegan ice cream in the world to finish off our last week in Auckland. I still have 2 more weeks of conservation work to go, which I will do in Wellington, though. I caught the bus on Saturday early in the morning to go to Wellington where I arrived in the evening - NZ is actually a pretty huge country with a mountainous landscape that makes the construction of big highways nearly impossible so so you always have to expect