Internship Abroad, New Zealand, Kate Liggett
As this past week came to a close, it left me with only 3 more weeks of living in New Zealand and working with Recreate. In just over 5 weeks, I have gone on 4 trips with work, gotten stuck on the Coromandel Peninsula, had my 22nd birthday, and learned so much than I imagined I would about working with youth and young adults with disabilities. This past week was my favorite trip I've taken with Recreate so far. It was their National Camp, where participants came from all of their different regions come together for a week of adventure activities.
To start off our week, we drove about 5 hours south of Auckland to the center of the North Island, near National Park (look it up, that's the full name of the park). We got settled into our lodge and learned a bit more about how our week would go from one of the staff at the adventure center where we were staying. Our activities for the week were canoeing, caving, and whitewater rafting. With 31 people, including the leaders, we were broken into 3 groups for our activities. My group started with canoeing and caving on Wednesday.
The canoeing trip was relatively laid back with a nice paddle across a lake, a stop for morning tea, and a paddle back to our van. After eating lunch, we drove to a cave down a dirt road where the van got stuck. I ended up standing on the back bumper of the van to add some weight and get the back left wheel to touch the ground. The actual cave was very cool. There was a shallow river running through it and there were glow worms, which were very cool to see. I was very proud of all of the participants in the group attempting to cave and going all the way through with the group. There were a few moments where some of them needed to be comforted and reassured, but we ultimately had a very good caving experience. It helped that our guide from the adventure center was very helpful with our participants and good at working with their ability levels.
On Thursday, the group I was in spent the day whitewater rafting. I was, again, proud that the entire group gave rafting a go despite concerns about being cold and wet (it's winter here but we had the proper gear supplied to us). Our guide was absolutely incredible. He has over 30 years of raft guiding experience and was extremely patient with our group. The trip down the river was great, and we got to learn a lot about the wildlife on the river as well as the pumice stone that floats in some parts of it.
The adventure parts of the week were so much fun and it seems like all of the participants really got a lot out of the challenges, especially since every single one did everything. Outside of the adventure parts of the week, it was incredible to see all the bonding that happened and fun that was had when we weren't able to get the DVD player we brought to work and there wasn't very good cell reception. I also learned a lot more about helping participants with personal hygiene, whether that meant a reminder to brush teeth before bed or helping someone with the temperature of their shower water (after convincing them to take a shower). It was a great trip to close out my 3 straight weeks of trips with Recreate.
My 3 remaining weeks don't seem like a long enough time to me, but I'm going to make the best out of them that I possibly can.
As this past week came to a close, it left me with only 3 more weeks of living in New Zealand and working with Recreate. In just over 5 weeks, I have gone on 4 trips with work, gotten stuck on the Coromandel Peninsula, had my 22nd birthday, and learned so much than I imagined I would about working with youth and young adults with disabilities. This past week was my favorite trip I've taken with Recreate so far. It was their National Camp, where participants came from all of their different regions come together for a week of adventure activities.
To start off our week, we drove about 5 hours south of Auckland to the center of the North Island, near National Park (look it up, that's the full name of the park). We got settled into our lodge and learned a bit more about how our week would go from one of the staff at the adventure center where we were staying. Our activities for the week were canoeing, caving, and whitewater rafting. With 31 people, including the leaders, we were broken into 3 groups for our activities. My group started with canoeing and caving on Wednesday.
The canoeing trip was relatively laid back with a nice paddle across a lake, a stop for morning tea, and a paddle back to our van. After eating lunch, we drove to a cave down a dirt road where the van got stuck. I ended up standing on the back bumper of the van to add some weight and get the back left wheel to touch the ground. The actual cave was very cool. There was a shallow river running through it and there were glow worms, which were very cool to see. I was very proud of all of the participants in the group attempting to cave and going all the way through with the group. There were a few moments where some of them needed to be comforted and reassured, but we ultimately had a very good caving experience. It helped that our guide from the adventure center was very helpful with our participants and good at working with their ability levels.
On Thursday, the group I was in spent the day whitewater rafting. I was, again, proud that the entire group gave rafting a go despite concerns about being cold and wet (it's winter here but we had the proper gear supplied to us). Our guide was absolutely incredible. He has over 30 years of raft guiding experience and was extremely patient with our group. The trip down the river was great, and we got to learn a lot about the wildlife on the river as well as the pumice stone that floats in some parts of it.
The adventure parts of the week were so much fun and it seems like all of the participants really got a lot out of the challenges, especially since every single one did everything. Outside of the adventure parts of the week, it was incredible to see all the bonding that happened and fun that was had when we weren't able to get the DVD player we brought to work and there wasn't very good cell reception. I also learned a lot more about helping participants with personal hygiene, whether that meant a reminder to brush teeth before bed or helping someone with the temperature of their shower water (after convincing them to take a shower). It was a great trip to close out my 3 straight weeks of trips with Recreate.
My 3 remaining weeks don't seem like a long enough time to me, but I'm going to make the best out of them that I possibly can.