Marchmont Gardens Hanmer Springs

... thing.
Anyway in Christchurch, I had breakfast, got my blood test results which say I’m fine, so clearly I am crazy and my weirdly expanding chest is just a reaction to watching to many Alien movies. So that’s good news, also in Christchurch it wasn’t raining which is also good news but a few points lower on the scale of good.
Anyway after breakfast, some shopping and ...

... going to change my life, but I am sure it will have life changing impacts on my attitude.

We do a hike in the afternoon that is amazing. Unlike anything that I have hike before. We hike for awhile and then visit the hot springs afterwards. The local food is stone grilled lamb and we get this for dinner. What an incredible day. One day left before Fiji and despite the cold weather, we are going to miss this place.

... vigorous after the rain.  Our eventual goal for the day was Hanmer Springs.  It was an odd choice. It's a long drive from Abel Tasman to Christchurch, so we thought Hanmer would be a good place to stop for the night. It's a bit off the beaten track - 8 kilometers off the main highway.   We were a bit surprised how quickly we got there. We arrived with plenty of time to explore the small mountain resort town and actually visit ...

... some parts of the mountains. Scarred sh--tess is an understatement, but Tim didn't drive off the road and we only encountered a few cars and one truck on the two lane part. The scenery was spectacular so it made up for the fright. Since the sun was shining on the mountains it made for a beautiful drive. I got a picture of sheep, but there is a weed in front of him. We will try today to get a really good closeup picture. If not I'll buy a postcard.

... Nice sales technique. For some reason that I can't quite define, I don't rate homeopathic preparations that highly. We have taken the precaution of swallowing conventional Serious Drugs that I happened to have with me. The group is the usual cross section of foreigners travelling in NZ: smartly dressed Germans (I was going to say well-dressed but it depends on your view of men wearing red trousers and designer label yellow polo shirts), keen Dutchmen, a couple of Japanese ...

Can you believe it - our final destination on the NZ tours - Hanmer Springs. We stayed here for a couple of days and treated ourselves to a bit of luxury. To say that we were skint by this point is a total understatement. We had been living on noodles and bread for the last 2 weeks and had been washing in rivers, lakes and whatever cold showers we could find. So ...

Arrived in New Zealnad after a short panic as our flight from London to Singapore was delayed. The pilot must have been flapping his wings as we made up most of the time but only had 30 mins to transfer to our connecting flight from Singapore to Christchurch. Landed in Christchurch at 1030 hrs which meant that we had a fantastic view of the Alps and Mount Cook as we ...

... these planes being delayed. I thought to myself, its a bit odd a jetstar employee hasn't come to the gate or made an announcement? As I was about to get up and go in search of answers, I saw Eileen at the gate about to make an announcement. I was waving frantically, but the poor love couldn't see me and wasn't until she was a few meters in front of me, she worked out it was me!! No time for chatting as she was busy at work... however the penny ...

... t you?!), so we joined the throngs tip-toeing goose-pimpled between pools of various temperature and testing how long we could remain in the hottest of them - 43 degrees! After a few hours relaxation it was time to head off again. Kaikoura was our next stop - prime location for dolphins and seals...

... There is a sudden drop from 150 meters deep to 1,000 meters deep and therefore you can see many species normally found much further off-shore. I went for the Whale-Watching option. We saw two sperm whales from a distance. It was nice to see real whales but overall I wasn't too impressed with the experience. The extremely choppy waters and kille hangover definitely didnt help though!