23.11.-2.12.

After spending the last 2 nights in Paihia with many other Germans, a little alcohol, and beautiful starry skies, we were supposed to go WWOOFing on a farm in Whangaroa on Friday. WWOOF stands for Willing Workers On Organic Farms, which means that we are allowed to work for a few hours a day on the farm and eat and live with the relatives.

Kindly, our host picked us up on Friday morning and after shopping, we drove to his farm. His ''farm'' consisted of 3 dogs, 2 cats, some hens, and a few disabled roosters who crowed not only at 5 o'clock in the morning but all day and all night. Our host lived in a hut, which was half a storage basement, and we lived in a trailer-like thing.

Unfortunately, we never really got any work because our host lived and relaxed very casually. It may sound relaxed at first, but not for 2 teenage girls who don't have Wi-Fi there and who can only find animals within a radius of 10km.

Besides eating and playing mobile games, we did experience some things: touched a 3-day-old chick, went boating, and Sophia even caught 2 fish while fishing, which we could eat in the evening - by the way, food is the best thing about WWOOFing. Also, we drove a car here for the first time and as a conclusion, we were at a beach called Tauranga Bay yesterday. It is completely quiet here and there are no tourists in sight, as it is very off the beaten track. So a kind of insider tip if you want to get away from the hustle and bustle of people.

So you can't completely badmouth the time, it was definitely worth an experience.

Oh yeah, one thing I have already learned here: New Zealand mosquitoes are little rascals. They bite you and it's not just a bit itchy, you scratch yourself so much at night and it doesn't stop for days 😭

Now we are on a new farm since today and for the first time on the West Coast. The place we are staying is called Waimamaku, another very small and rural place here. But there is Wi-Fi and we have our own little cabin with our own bathroom and a real bed, which is a huge luxury overall after the last week. The host is very nice and hopefully we will get a little work to do here 🌿🌵