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Published: February 29th 2008
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I'll have that medium-rare
Cooking my own Surf 'n' Turf in Christchurch Hi Everyone,
This will be the first of two shortish entries covering our last few weeks in New Zealand.
We arrived in Christchurch from Kaikoura where we had done the whale watching, and after a 10 minute walk we found our way to our accomodation. We got ourselves clean, we had a good meal and we did whatever we felt like because we were staying at the Y.M.C.A. We had a great room that would put some chain hotels to shame (I'm talking to you Holiday Inn and Hilton!).
After doing so much in a short space of time, Christchurch was a chance for us to relax a bit before our next round of only staying in places for a few days. The city was very English (but with good weather) and it bought about a few thoughts of home, hence the rather sad sight of me going round the city looking for any sports bars that might be showing English football. At 9am in the morning. I also enjoyed a full English fry up.
On the tourist front, we went to the Antarctic Centre, as C'church is the location where Scientists from around the globe set
Christchurch Botanical Gardens
GM farming had really taken off in New Zealand off for their stints in the Antarctic. The centre has a room that mimics a snow storm, with temperatrures dropping to about -15c. They also had lots of Blue Penguins and loads of great info on the wildlife and exploration of the region.
With our continuous eating out we got back on the exercise bike,literally, with a 'Spin' class at the gym that was part of the YMCA complex. If you don't know Spin, it's a room full of exercise bikes facing the front where a class leader spends an hour barking at you to increase resistance and pedal faster. By the end we both looked like we'd been dragged through a hedge backwards. Then beaten up by Mike Tyson. Then thrown down a cliff.
Finally, the last couple of evening we spent some time with the children of Judi who had hosted us in Nelson. They were great company and encouraged us to have a couple more great meals out at a place called Dux De Lux.
From Christchurch we caught a plane back to the North Island to Rotorua. This was a big challenge for Jaime who does not like flying and so is really
Snow Joke
Jaime on the snow mobile at the Arctic Centre. overcoming a lot of challenges on this trip. This journey was a particular challengs as it was the smallest plane she'd ever travelled on. The flight was so bumpy that I started to feel quesy but Jaime passed with flying colours.
Rotorua is all about the natural thermal pools that are in the area. The whole town smells of eggs because of the gasses that eminate from the ground. A great place to break wind without having to shoulder the blame.
On our first full day we went to the town's Polynesian Spa where we got a hot pool for two overlooking Lake Rotorua followed by a good hour in the main pools that all have different temperatures (36c, 38c, 40c and 42c). We continued the English theme by going for a curry afterwards.
The next day, and as an early birthday present from my mum and dad we went to Hell's Gate. A park containing natural mud pools that has been used by Maori for hundreds of years for health reasons and to protect themselves. It was amazing to see these pools of mud bubbling at up to 120c, with steam coming up from the ground
Well Done J!
Overcame her fears and got through the bumpy flight to Rotorua from Christchurch all around you. The park was called Hell's Gate by the Playwrite George Bernard Shaw (who wrote Pygmalion/My Fair Lady) and apparently you can find 85% of the periodic table in one form or another in the park. While there we also did a maori wood calving and learnt about why NZ sports teams have the Silver Fern as there sports symbol!
Hell's gate also includes a spa and we went for aprivate mud bath which was a lot of fun. It was great for the skin but the freezing cold shower you have to have afterwards wasn't so enjoyable!
The let down of Rotorua was the accomodation, a holiday park hostel. On the first night it sounded like all of Japan was having a party outside our door so we were happy to have done what we wanted in the town and were ready to move on after a couple of nights to our next destination, Taupo. All ready for one of the things we'd been looking forward to for weeks, Prawn Park. I kid you not...
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