Mistaken for royalty, being infamous and the final rugby match of my trip

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Friday morning and I was off on the bus to Christchurch. Wondered what planet the bus driver was on when he asked me if I was Zara Phillips, until I saw the front page of the Christchurch Press - as Zara Phillips was on the front of it dressed practically the same as I was on Friday! The North Face sleeveless puffa is clearly the attire of choice for royalty and also us ‘mere commoners’ who feel the cold in NZ. Checked back into Hotel So and then headed off for a lunch in the sunshine on ‘the strip’, which is really called Oxford Terrace, but has a load of cafes and bars on it. Then spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around the lanes off of Lichfield Street and found some cute little boutique shops and also the obligatory coffee shops. It was time for my favourite chore of doing laundry when I got back to the hotel and even hit on the great idea of combining it with drinking a couple of glasses of champagne at the hotel bar. The bar staff must have thought that I was mad dashing off every 20 mins to check on my laundry, but they were happy enough when I drank them out of champagne (but only took 2 glasses to do so!?!). Feeling hungry I then ventured down Old Lordship Lane to the ‘Fish ‘n’ Chip Cafe’ and had the first ‘fush and chups’ of my travels, and have to admit that they were delicious - oh and the Malborough Riesling that accompanied them wasn’t bad either.

Must admit that it was a bit of a slow start on Saturday, but headed out for a run around Hagley Park which helped me in feeling alive again. After getting ready at the hotel, I then headed back in the direction of Hagley Park - but this time walked around the botanic gardens too. Managed to avoid getting run over by the trams of Christchurch that are not too dissimilar from those in San Fran! The walk back to Hotel So went via the market on Worcester Street, but resisted making any purchases (the bag simply cannot get any heavier or they won’t allow me on the plane back to Sydney!). Once in the obligatory England shirt, I stopped off for a quick drink at the hotel bar and the barman commented ‘we have ordered plenty more champagne after your escapades last night’ - oopps! Told him that rugby means drinking beer though, well for me at least anyway. The walk to the stadium was via another bar down one of the lanes (called ‘red square’ or red something anyway), where a group of guys apparently recognised me from being in the ‘Fish n Chip Cafe’ - v bizarre. Arrived at the stadium and had an English guy and his son ask me if I was ‘that girl from the Auckland test’, which was a little odd, until they explained that they were sat near me at the test match last weekend and thought that my ‘commentary’ of the match was very amusing and agreed with all of my substitutes that I proposed during the course of the match. Well, to say that I was embarrassed would be an understatement - I apologised for my behaviour and said that I might have had too many beers!!! The second test match was just as bad as the first, in terms of England’s performance, and that’s all that I can say (or want to say) about it. The ‘blitz’ performance by the army band and the spitfire flyover through fireworks whilst the players were warming up was fun though!

Might have had a ‘few’ beers by the end of Saturday night and so Sunday was a struggle. Slept, slept and slept until it was fairly late and headed out for food - then just watched TV (and thankfully managed to avoid any re-runs of the match!). Spent the evening packing for heading back to the Cook Islands and can’t wait to be back in 29 degrees and sunshine! Bring it on...

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