Clang, clang, clang went the trolley. Ding, ding, ding went the bell!

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I wake to a gloriously sunny day so get out early to explore Christchurch. I'm hoping to join a free walking tour, or failing that hop on and off the old trams. I've time to have a spot of breakfast first so find a cafe with an unusual setting. As I'm tucking into my poached egg on toast and milky tea in a kind of arcade area - indoors - a tram squeezes past me literally inches away!

I mooch on over to Church Square to see if the walking tour is on and notice the poor cathedral, badly effected by the earthquakes of 2011. It's so sad seeing this and other old buildings either half fallen down and waiting repair or seeing just photos of buildings that used to be there but have been totally destroyed. This of course is just buildings and masks the human tragedies that go by unseen.

The walking tour doesn't materialise so I grab myself a tram/gondola (cable car) combo ticket for the day and clamber on board the wooden tram. Our driver, Barry, tells us she (!) is 94 years old and was built in Christchurch. This and the other two trams running today belong to the historic society and are leased out to the tourism company that runs them. The hydro electricity and overhead electric cables are provided by the city council.

As we pass the many fenced off building sites we learn that so far the city is only 45% into the rebuild and it's cost a staggering $33 billion so far! One building, the art gallery, sank during the quakes and cost $59 million to repair. During the period it was being repaired they commissioned loads of street artwork to provide a bit of joy and uplifting of spirits after such heartache. My favourite piece is on the gable end of a brick building and is a portrait - apparently of a model called Theresa who lives in Melbourne - I have no idea why this information is relevant and kinda wish the tram guy hadn't told us wishing it had been of someone of more interest.

We pass over a pretty bridge spanning a small river. We find out that the river's Maori name is Otakaru which means 'playful river' (I think!) because the children use to play with the long fin eels that lived there.

As we continue around the tram's slightly altered route (one area is blocked by further damage to one building whose owner hadn't repaired it following the 2011 quakes) we have to get escorted by Bob the Builder through an area closed off to the public for building repairs. On the other side we reach the new temporary retail area that's been made from loads of shipping containers used in imaginative and creative ways. There's even a two-storey restaurant. As we carry on further round the tramway I notice the shipping containers are also being used as a way to shore up buildings, piled one on top of each other and also a few layers thick, a bit like buttresses on churches.

After enjoying the novelty of these lovely old Christchurch trams I go back to the hostel to put on more summery clothes and slap on some factor 50. It's 29 degrees according to the tram driver! Bit different to the sleet, hail, rain and freezing temperatures I left behind me in Norwich.

I walk across the road from the hostel to have a look around the botanical gardens. What an absolute haven of peace and tranquility in a broken city they are. There are some massive, ancient trees which were obviously able to withstand the earthquakes in a way many of the man-made buildings couldn't. I watch people being punted along the river that borders the botanic gardens. All very Cambridge! My favourite part of the gardens is planted up with New Zealand specimens in dedication to Leonard Cockayne, one of the country's most influential botanists who pioneered the study of New Zealand plants in their natural habitats.

I head back to the entrance of the botanic gardens where I'm to pick up my shuttle bus to the gondola ride up the mountain outside Christchurch. After about a fifteen minute drive we arrive at the bottom of the cable car ride. I'm able to get a 'gondola' to myself and enjoy pratting about taking more silly photos (I'd declined their professional 'we're going to try and fleece you out of many monies to buy some silly photo you'll probably lose or ruin before you get home' effort - I prefer my own versions). As my gondola gets nearer to the top it is much windier and it starts to sway from side to side quite alarmingly - probably because it's not heavy enough with just me inside compared to at least three in the other gondolas. I arrive in one piece and walk up the stairs to the restaurant and viewing area. Wow what a surprise. There's a lake area surrounded by hills and beyond that the sea. There are villages and a small town clinging to the edges of the lake and it's all so picturesque. I've changed my mind about Hobbiton, I want to live here instead!

Looking towards Christchurch I see it's actually next to a sweeping bay, or estuary. There's loads of urban sprawl that isn't so apparent when you're tramming it around the city centre. In the distance is a long mountain range.

I decide to treat myself to a proper big meal at the restaurant to save cooking at the hostel tonight. With such a view it would be rude not to. Later I manage to find the way out onto the hillside and go for a walk out to a 'bluff' as the way marker calls it. There I find some geocachers re-hiding a cache so I go and introduce myself. They are local cachers from Lyttleton, the gorgeous place we are looking down on from above, near the lake. They'd just put a travel bug in the box so were very pleased when I offered to take it half way across the world with me back to the UK. Photos taken we say our goodbyes and after a bit of souvenir shopping and hat purchase (my scalp was starting to get a bit pink) I go back down in an even more swaying gondola (the wind must have picked up) before catching my shuttle bus back to the city.

What a wonderful day. I'm so lucky. Big grins. Moving on to Dunedin tomorrow on an early bus so I'd best get repacked and off to bed. Goodnight.

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