Chestnuts On Holly Christchurch

... hot and we all had to change into Bali things from the suitcases!
The funny thing..... I guess I had decided that 2 changes were not nearly enough...so the last stop before Christchurch had us wearing every layer we could find..it was ICY cold!
The arrival time into CHCH of 7pm was pretty good, considering I had worked until midday ,I was very proud of myself for leaving before 3pm...LOL.
We had not accounted ...

... water, the works. The driver is an older NZ guy and he is great- really friendly and welcoming. We pick up a full car full then set off in the downpour.
I needn't have worried- as we drive out of Christchurch the skies clear and it looks like we are in for an amazing day- little do i know how amazing!! The roads in NZ are so easy, its the one place ive been abroad and thought i would love to hire a car- they are long, and straight as far as the eye can see ...

We flew in on an early morning flight from Auckland at 6:10AM. I think Air New Zealand has taken to 1 person to serve an entire plane. I think it's a bit overdone. After arriving at the terminal, there was no live person but a bunch of machines. Everyone needed to figure out how to use the machines to check in for their flight ...

... both of us had already been before. We took a wine tour out to the Napa Valley and Sonoma on our last day. It was good to taste yet more delicious wine and add to my global repetoire!! It was perfect weather that day, so we had lunch sat on the grass in Sonoma town square. The time went too fast as it always does, and it was then time for lea to head back to her life and me to move onto my final desination.

Chicago. This i where my ...

... 7 films. Nightlife hadn't been so wild. At this point, I wasn't so excited for the Kiwi Experience. In Australia, I'd done everything myself and I could do what I wanted when I wanted. I didn't have to rely on anyone else and was very much doing my own thing. Kiwi experience involves being with a group a lot of the time and the timings of the buses are much more structured. The thought of less freedom didn't excite me. I dunno what I was worried about though...

Saying farewell to Kaikoura until the end of the month, we headed three hours south along the coast to the South Island's largest city, Christchurch. This is in the Christchurch & Canterbury region of the island, being one of seven regions, the Nelson & Marlborough region being the other one we have visited so far. Christchurch is traditionally the most English of the cities in NZ with gothic ...

... dont really understand how people can (or would want to) live in Canada or Russia if it gets that cold! After this part of the trip we got to see little blue penguins, which were great, as i love penguins! All the ones that were there were poorly and so were being looked after by the centre. Once we have more permanent work we will start going further afield with our time off, hence having more to report.

So, first impressions of Christchurch/NZ: a phenomenal landscape ...

... so like home (except for the sun). The potentially beautiful city was disfigurred by the same awful concrete, plastic and glass monstrosoties that blight British cities, the people looked the same, they dressed the same, the cars were the same, the shops are the same. It's like we went as far away as possible from the UK as we could and nothing changed. We had a wander, looked in some shops, had a beer at a place celebrating St. Patricks day and went to a Greek restaurant ...

... from, turning on the windshield wiper when you mean to hit the turn-signal, learning to look up and left to use your rear -view mirror. Then there is all the careful driving in a city because you never know when you are going to have to detour because of abruptly ending or one-way streets.  And of course, there is scaring your passenger because you are adjusting to judging distances from the other side of the car. 

... so ended up on bum and found out why they give you gloves to wear, not having worn them as they were too bulky, ouch! Toby comes to rescue me and I then managed to master the snow plough a bit better. After, Toby takes off skiing on his own, whilst I take my second lesson and after my instructor checked out the group ability, we were taken up to the next slope. Getting on and off the chair lift went without a hitch thankfully, although I have a few more tumbles throughout ...