Life Update - 1 Week In New Zealand

Last Updated on 12th July 2022

We’ve now officially spent 1 week in New Zealand; as this post goes live, we’ll have spent over a week ‘living’ in Katikati, New Zealand and it’s been the most amazing adventure so far.

For those of you who don’t know, I actually used to live in New Zealand for 8 months back in 2011/2012 and I’m now back here with Matt for the first stage of our trip around the world.

While I’ve been updating Instagram every single day, I wanted to put everything into a blog post so that you guys are completely filled in on what we’ve been up to so far.

It’s been an absolutely exhausting week or so, but it’s also been the most incredible adventure and I feel so unbelievably grateful and happy that I’m back here.

Here’s everything we’ve been up to in our first week in New Zealand!

After a gruelling 40+ hours of travelling all the way from my parents’ house in Penrith, to arriving at our ‘new house’ in New Zealand, it’s safe to say we were pretty exhausted when we finally got to the house.

Our first night involved a little unpacking, a lot of food and getting accustomed to our new surroundings.

Life in New Zealand

After a ridiculously early night, we awoke the next morning ready to learn more about our new home for the next 6 weeks or so.

We’re actually housesitting for my old next door neighbours from when we lived in New Zealand back in 2011 which is so bloody cool as it means I get to see everything again and I’m already pretty familiar with the way of life.

One thing that’s a huge difference for both Matt and I however, is the farming lifestyle. While the house we’re looking after isn’t technically a farm, it is home to 1 dog, 4 cats, 1 goat, 5 sheep, a hive of thousands of bees and approximately 20 chickens…

The goat (Summer) is generally well behaved and isn’t much of a hassle. However, she can also be boisterous when she wants to be and both Matt and I have been head-butted by her a couple of times already!

The sheep require little to no maintenance, but they do need moving from one bit of land to another every couple of days. They can also escape sometimes; which actually happened just 20 minutes after we arrived home from dropping the family we’re housesitting for at the airport!

It took us a little while (around 45 minutes) to get them back into the right patch of grass, but since then we’ve had no bother!

The family dog, Basil, is an absolute delight and it’s so nice to have a furry friend in the house again as Matt and I both grew up with dogs but we didn’t actually have one in our studio apartment.

We’ve taken Basil out on lots of walks and it’s hard not to when you’re surrounded by vast open roads and beautiful scenery.

In terms of ‘house’ pets, as well as Basil, we’re also in charge of looking after four cats; two kittens and two older cats.

I’m also loving this part of life in New Zealand as since becoming a cat person only a couple of years ago, I now absolutely adore the furry little creatures.

The two kittens are much friendlier than the older ones and they’ll often come for cuddles during the day and evening.

Looking after a house and approximately 4 acres of land involves quite a lot of hard work, but Matt’s thoroughly enjoying being in charge of looking after the grass (as you can see by the delighted look on his face!).

As well as ensuring the grass is well-kept, we’ve also been spending an awful lot of time outside in the paddock and orchard; tending to fallen branches, overgrown vegetable patches, collecting feijoas and picking up fallen leaves.

To say that I never used to be an outdoorsy person, I’m thoroughly enjoying being fully immersed in the outdoors lifestyle!

The fact that New Zealand is also unbelievably picturesque definitely helps to encourage me to be outside much more as it would be rude not to!

As well as spending so much time outside in the orchard, we’ve also been on 3 walks/hikes which have totalled around 7 hours!

Katikati is abundant in beautiful hikes and treks and we’ve only just began to scratch the surface on what it has to offer. We’ve got many more hikes scheduled in and I can’t wait to get exploring more of this stunning country!

Our first week in New Zealand has been absolutely fantastic, albeit rather exhausting, but there’s really no place I’d rather be; in a stunning country with my best friend!