Equestrian Hotel Christchurch

... window shopping and walked through the cathedral. We also walked up the 134 steep and narrow stairs to the top of the tower. The view from up there was fabulous and we had the top of the tower to ourselves. When we returned to the ground floor to exit we discovered they had forgotten about us and we had been locked in a small room at the bottom of the stairs. Luckily, one of the workers heard us quickly before we ...

... Rookie ( for that was what on pickup's license plate ROOKIE ). The cop comes over tests me for alcohol - Negative naturally but still proceeds to fine NZD 200.00. What! for driving a bit overlimit and crossing the dividing lines a few times? something which we do in Delhi all the time as a brith right??? All my pleadngs to lessen burden is of no use. A highly chastened self ( The lesson remains with me for the rest of the trip till we reach India ). We finally reach Haast ...

... control bars hit your legs. I had that baby standing on it's nose every second corner and I still didn't get a dose of road rash! The best fun you can have with your pants on! The gondola ride down was also a bit of a thrill as you exit into space.  We regrouped and set off to Te Arnu. Along the way we saw heaps of deer farms and I started drooling again. We stopped at a village proclaiming that it was the venison capital. Checked the shops and you guessed it - no venison. I drove ...

Counting down the days till the USA trip. 9 days to go. Major plan is to have a great trip, see the sights, catch up with friends, learn how to blog, yep you are my guinea pigs! and attend Katrina and Lou's wedding. Air Tickets booked, accomodation sorted thanks to Expedia (most of it!) Domestic flights booked thanks to Julie at Riccarton House of Travel. The basic Itinerary. West coast, travel with Sue, good friend, travel buddy and colleague at work ...

... or so anyway (although being a labourer really isn't my style!). And Bex has been doing whatever teaching hours she can get hold of too, whilst looking for work to fit around it in her spare time. The main plus side of not having a job is that i now know the city really damn well! Still we know that these things take time, and at least we are not having to dip in to our savings to get by. We've started making some buddies and its all lovely! <br><br>We have managed to squeeze ...

... in the city less than an hour and was from Australia. Not a good time to bring out the good samaritan in me. Not perturbed I continued on. The air was crisp and cold. I'd been waiting for this moment for the past few months; to be standing in Cathedral square, not just looking at a picture of it on a website. I took tentative steps until I eased into this solo-traveller thing. I visited a souvenir shop and took pics of the river Avon and various points of ...

... where I have been hiking, about what food I am carrying, etc. He was not happy about the fact that I was carrying two jars of honey which I had purchsed on Kangaroo Island. Apparently, there is a disease affecting bees in New Zealand which can be spread by contact with honey from other places that have the disease. They have a ban on importing any honey from anywhere into New Zealand. They told me I had two options: throw away ...

... Lake Taupo, I've been peeling like a snake.... Anyhow, after Lake Taupo, we travelled south again to Wellington, which is the capital of New Zealand (not Aukland like I thought). We stayed at a really nice B&B that was also very reasonably priced. The couple that ran it were New Zealanders....Autry was of Mauri and Scottish decent, and Joy of English and Danish decent. They had us for supper too, and served us wine and beer and dessert....the whole nine yards...it was ...

After a 6 am wakeup call following New Year's, I made my way to the airport to fly to Christchurch, New Zealand, on the South Island. Since I didn't have to be anywhere until January 9th for orientation, I thought this would be a great chance to visit New Zealand. On the advice of several friends from Kellogg, I decided to do the South Island, which is very sparsely populated but incredibly beautiful. I flew into Christchurch, the largest city on ...

... it did fight back on the way down from Arthur's Pass when one of the electric window motors blew and left us with a nice way in for the rain. We got to Christchurch and stopped at Repco (car spares) where we were sorted out for nothing by a passing car window repair man, who separated the glass from the motor so at least we could seal the window shut. Kiwis are among the nicest people on the planet - except behind the wheel of a car, we had a horrible near miss approaching ...