Moving South

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A dark day (yesterday) marred the normally punctual nature of the transportation network of the British Commonwealth. A new ferry boat in just its 2nd day of service was more than 3 hours behind schedule in leaving Wellington due to a number of factors including: poorly orchestrated loading/unloading of commercial and passenger vehicles and miscalculations of tide/ballast.

Side note: the ferry was enormous, over 22,000 tons I believe. This is close to 3x the size of the other ferries they'd been running over the same route.

It was an international event really: Kiwi TV stations reported on the happenings at both ends of the ferry run. The ship was built by Danes, and had previously operated in France. Still, one anonymous passenger (certainly a NZ native) placed the blame squarely on the shoulders of the ferry company's new Australian ownership. "Where would we be without the Australians?" he was overheard asking rhetorically in Wellington harbor. Had I thought of it at the time, I would've quickly returned that _literally_ we'd probably be at the destination terminal in Picton harbor...

...

We're in Christchurch now, staying with the Thomases who we plan to spend the next few days with here. They're not only showing us around town and the Canterbury region here, but they're taking us by car down to Queenstown with stopovers to see the lakes and mountains along the way.

Today:

• Driving tour around C'Church
  
• Trip to the Banks Peninsula and lovely little French town there, the name slips my mind right now.
  
• NZ vs Zimbabwe cricket match on the tube.
  
• 'Pavlova' homemade by Pam Thomas, a pudding dessert w/ Kiwis on top (the fruit, not the people). Photos coming soon!
  
• Looking at photos from Frank and his daughter Katherine's trips to Europe and S. Africa.
  

Fun facts that I learned today from Frank and Pam:

* NZ has more helicopters per capita than any other nation state.
* In NZ 98%!o(MISSING)f the population lives within 40km of the coast (I have yet to verify this using the ArcGIS buffer wizard).
* Annually, NZ university students organize something called the "Undy 500" (or is it Undi?). This is a car race cum pub crawl from Christchurch to Dunedin (further south). The trip must be done in a car purchased for less than 500 NZ dollars, hence the name. Cars are apparently decoratively painted for the occasion, often times w/ witty messages, or announcements in the case of the one we saw today that proclaimed: "Mike is the sh#t".


-Cory

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Photos

Travelers with Gracious Hosts
Pam, Frank, Sherry, and Cory with a view of Lyttleton, Christchurch's harbor.

View of Akaroa Harbour
On Banks Peninsula near Christchuch.

Aotearoa
In the Maori language, New Zealand is called Aotearoa or 'Land of the Long White Cloud'. Thought this was a good representative photo.

Another View of Akaroa Harbour
On Banks Peninsula near Christchuch.

View from Kaikoura
This is about 2 hours N. of Christchurch on the east coast of the S. Island. The mountains there run right down to the sea. This photo was taken around sunset.

Geography Matters
I didn't need a GPS to figure out the approximate latitude of Wellington on New Zealand's North Island...

Pavalova
No, Pavalova isn't the latest Russian, female tennis player. It's a pudding-like dessert special to New Zealand. Pam made one for us and it was delicious!

A Pebble Beach
On the way back from Akaroa, Pam and Frank took us to this beach that was about 16 miles long and nothing but flat grey stones.

Don't You Dare
Bet you never gave much thought to pigs' male reproductive liquids. Sorry that now you have.

Russley Golf Club
Frank's golf club in Christchurch. Spelling errors apologized. No, neither Sherry nor I dared attempt to play.

Sheep
These sheep were being herded along the road by a vehicle or two and a dog or two. Novel to the travelers, this needed to be documented the readership.

Silence Lambs!
It's coming on Spring here in NZ and that means that sheep are getting sheared and also giving birth. Here are a few lambs that we managed to catch close enough to photograph.

Wellington Harbor
We left Wellington on the N. Island for Picton on the S. Island.

Wellington Harbor
After the boat finally left port... ; )

Tip Toeing thru the...
...okay, so they're daffodils, not tulips. This is in Christchurch's Botanic Gardens.

Comments

[Timoney]

cross-cultural parallels
It's heartening to know that New Zealand university students have a mastery of the English language that equals their American counterparts.

[Shaw]

Mike is the $hit
I think he may be on to something.