This year I participated in the Year 12 Outdoor Education trip. On this trip  you spend a lot of time outdoors hiking and biking along Dunedin's Peninsula. Before the trip started I really didn't know how to feel. Of course I was excited but I also was quite nervous because I never did a trip like this before. I always thought the outdoors was not for me, so I also was scared that I would not enjoy the trip. Spoiler: I really enjoyed the trip with all the fresh air and exercise.

The trip started on Sunday the 13th of October and we met at 9 in the morning at the school gym. After loading the van, checking all the gear and a safety talk from Mrs Matthews we started our journey with a bike ride to Bethunes Gully.

The 6 km bike ride was easy but at the end we needed to ride up a little steep hill that was surprisingly hard to get up. In the end everyone got up and we had a short break. From there we went all the way up to Mount Cargill, we walked 4.5 km up the mountain, where we had our well earned lunch break. From the top of Mount Cargill  we walked to the Organ Pipes, which are stones that were formed like Organ Pipes over hundred of years ago because of the pressure of the volcano that Dunedin was built on. The best part of Sunday came after we walked down to a street where our bikes were. We got onto our bikes and started a great bike ride to Waitai that was pure downhill for 9 km. It was great. We didn't need to do anything, just to be careful not to fall over, and the view was fantastic. On the bike ride we went past farm land with lots of sheep. The sheep were cute but the little lambs were very adorable. 

In Waitati we stayed at Te Whare Arohanui, where we prepared our sleeping room and dinner. We cooked outside on camping cookers. This resulted in not completely cooked pasta with sauce for my group. In the evening we spend our time playing card games and spoons. At the end of the day me and probably everybody else was ready for a good amount of sleep. 

The next morning we woke up at quarter past seven, which is way too early for my liking but we needed to start early so everybody could eat breakfast and clean the whare. We needed to clean everything including the bathrooms, which luckily was not my task. 

After cleaning the whare we started our day with walking to Orokonui; there we met with a very nice and colour full women called Tahu and her assistant Pearl. With Pearl we walked through Orokonui and looked at the stunning nature and animals.

Orokonui was wonderful to walk through. At one point of our walk we had a break and Pearl and our teacher Mrs Matthews saw some excrement of a Kiwi bird. She picked it up and made us smell it. It was not the nicest smell but it is a nice memory  because of how everybody reacted to the smell. The faces everybody was making were great and made us all laugh. 

From Orokonui we went to Mihiwaka. Where we met with Tim for an abseiling session. The walk up to the abseiling spot was a real challenge because there wasn't a real path to walk up. Even though it was probably not the safest walk on our journey I think it was one of my favourites because it was physically challenging but still fun. 

What I thought would be the worst part of the journey for me turned out to be quite nice. This part for me was the abseiling. I am not the biggest fan of heights, so the abseil was very scary for me. But luckily I still did the abseil because the view was definitely worth being scared for a few minutes. 

From Mihiwaka we continued our journey to Port Chalmers, from where we caught a boat to spend the night on Quarantine Island. 

After arriving at Quarantine Island we unpacked the chilli-bin and settled in for the night. On the Island we students needed to cook dinner in a big group. Before the trip we all agreed to make baked potatoes with multiple topics, garlic bread and veggies on the side. Because there were a lot of people the cooking in the small kitchen was exhausting but the end result was worth it. 

Later in the evening we had a small walk around the Island where we saw a wonderful sunset with bright colours and a great view because of the low tide that reflected the colours of the sky.

After the walk we had a little quiz night, where my team clearly did not win but still had a good time. After not winning the quiz night I spent the evening playing card games with the others. But after a while everybody went to bed because we all were exhausted  from the day. 

The night on the Island was probably one of the worst nights of sleep I ever had. As beautiful as the Island is, the beds are not so great. They were really hard but if one person turned around everybody knew it, because the beds were extremely loud.

Even though the night was not the best, I was excited for the bike ride back to school. 

But before we started to bike back to school we stopped at the Marine Studies centre. There we looked at different animals and went to the touch tanks where we could touch some small crabs, snails and more. We also helped to collect some food for the seahorses at the centre.

After our small visit at the Marine Studies centre we started our 20 km bike ride. As we experienced the whole trip, the weather was not one of our supporters. We started our bike ride with a little bit of rain but that turned into a full rain with a headwind. We didn't have the best conditions but we all managed to complete the bike ride. Luckily we made breaks so everybody could catch up and everybody was fine. The bike ride was not as exhausting as it sounded. The 20 km bike ride sounded quite intimidating but in the end I really enjoyed it. And once you start there's no turning back. 

If somebody now asked me what I thought about the trip I can say that even though I was not convinced I would enjoy or like the trip I really did in the end. Alone exploring and getting to the area you live in is great. Of course some things are not as necessary to know like how Kiwi poo smells but it's always good to at least know where you live and what this place has to offer.