Prospects looked good as the sun came up for a day out and visits to places we had never been to before around Christchurch. And one thing you can definitely say is that Christchurch has a great bus service that transports you in a straightforward manner and buses appear well patronised. Following the major earthquakes 11 years ago there has been a considerable amount of rebuilding in the close to the city suburbs. All of the new builds in and around Bealey Avenue, which is roughly a kilometre to the centre of the CBD, are compact buildings of apartments, some up to 3 stories high. But it seems to work and there didn’t seem to be any unoccupied or awaiting a sale. Our first stop planned today is the Gondola in the Heathcote Valley at the ... read more

The last day of the Grand Tour was always planned to be a quiet one compared to the places we have been to over the past 3 weeks and 2 days. And the cold weather that arrived last night was probably going to mean that it would be an indoor day too. Although our motel was on the corner of a busy intersection we weren’t troubled during the night with traffic noise. So it seems double glazing or some other noise reducing construction material had done the trick. We were not due to fly home to Tauranga until just before 7pm tonight so have a few hours to fill in and it is just as well that we arranged to retain the rental car for another day as it would have been a miserable day going ... read more

We are down to the last day of our stay at Lake Tekapo and as we had hoped the dip in the hot tub on the deck at night has made our stay here very relaxing. We are pinching ourselves because we had found such a restful accommodation. There had been a bit more rain overnight but the prospects for a reasonable day without any further rain was on the cards which will ensure we get around the three close locations to the township that we want to explore and get a feeling for the history of this unique part of New Zealand. Heading out for some sightseeing our first location to visit were the twin lakes of Lake McGregor and Lake Alexandrina to the northwest of Tekapo township. From Tekapo you can’t see these lakes ... read more

We had a great night’s sleep in our studio unit above the town of Lawrence but we couldn’t afford to be too long lying in bed as it is a lengthy drive to Lake Tekapo today. Looking out down on the valley that the town sits in we expected to see the houses laid out before us but a heavy fog had descended and we could hardly see the exit from the property to the driveway that we would eventually have to negotiate. The weather forecast had rain in it for later in the day as we drove our way north and we hoped that the fog was not a fore runner of this. The owners of the studio unit we stayed in overnight had not been home when we arrived from Invercargill or when we ... read more

After we returned home last night from the pub we were sure the wind had abated or at least in the pitch blackness of Church Hill, Oban, it seemed that way. However, during the night the wind did return with gusto and we assume from a slightly different direction as something metallic was rattling noisily on the roof wanting to take off into the air and land somewhere to the east of us. Sunrise however revealed that the wind had blown itself out and it didn’t look like we would miss out on our boat trip to Paterson Inlet and Ulva Island at midday because of the wind. With time on our hands we lazed around and continued to enjoy the vistas from our Kiwi bach until it was time to head down the hill to ... read more