NZ: Christchurch

What are PROVIDORES, anything to do with steve? Well, we are back in NZ, now in Christchurch. We had a late flight last night and arrived at our motel at 1:30am. The flight was pretty bumpy, sudden big drops, eliciting screams from some passengers. The Super Shuttle to the motel worked well again. The Tuscana Lodge Motor Inn is very nice.

Our last place in Victoria was in Lorne, a nice motel overlooking the bay with Cockatoos on the balcony for breakfast. We finally found some kangaroos, apparently they all live on the golf courses. There are none on the land. They must be single figure handicap players, all the time they spend there! Some are better looking than some OFGM members I know.

Our final drive up the Great Ocean Drive was very nice from Lorne up to Geelong, it runs alongside the sea, lots of nice bays, hills on the landside, for most of the run. The road winds a bit, so progress is slow, with speed limits of 80kph or less for most of the way. A bit slower for us, with me looking out of the window, and Linda squeaking in protest at my late turns when I looked back at the road. Popped into Eddy's family restaurant for a massive stuffed Pita lunch in Geelong. F1 boat racing was running in the harbour - cool!

Been wandering around Christchurch, a small CBD on the Avon river, compact with nice restaurants and bars. The botanic garden looks great in its autumnal dressing. We drove out to Littleton on the first afternoon. Te whole of the peninsula down to Akaroa is volcanic with the harbours set in the craters and the crater walls forming a beautiful backdrop - except I had to drive over them, the roads are OK, but few crash barriers, similar to alpine roads you see on the Tour de France. It would have been Ok but my vertigo keeps jumping up at me. Never mind, I just closed my eyes.

Had another Alpine T-de-F over to Akaroa. Not far-to-go and the vertigo was a bit better. There is an interesting segue, as Akaroa is a an old French colony, well nearly anyway! A French whaling captain bought the whole peninsular from the Maoris, sailed back home and brought out settlers. In the meantime, dear old Albion negotiated a better deal for the whole of NZ and by the time they came back it was British, with a British warship, Britomart here. Ces't la vie. Anyway they decided to stay and Akaroa is a little bit of France in NZ. I bought a tank of essence there!. Its a lovely little town, well worth a days visit. Meeting with the old neighbours tonight for dinner.

Met Jan & Mick at their hotel for dinner, finally got to bed at 1:30am. Good evening, we laid in a bit but they had to be up at 5:00am for an early flight. We heard from them that the flight had technical problems and didn't go on time. We last saw tem in '87, they havn't really changed at all.





Spent the day at Hanmer Springs, a spa town in the foothills of the west coast mountains. We went to Thrill Seekers Canyon, a centre on the river that runs, rafting, jet boats, bungy, clay shooting, paintball, various driving things. We went on the jet boat. It was about 30km down the gorge. Pretty spectacular, 600hp, 60mph jobbies that need about 6inches of water once they are up on the plane. They skid right into the rocks and spin 360's, run up rapids - super! Linda was really brave, she had to go over a narrow unmade path on the side of the canyon to get in the boat. She gets the award of the CDM for that.



Winter has turned up here, snow is on its way the glaciers were closed to air traffic and it has rained all down the west coast for a couple of days. There are lovely autumn colours all around. Visitied Kakoura, an old whaing town that does whale watching in the summer. Pretty cold, there today, just wandered around took in the sights and whaling cottage. Raining back in Christchurch. Never mind, now going back to summer in Fiji and San Diego!