Christchurch to....Christchurch - By Special Guest Writers Derek & Rosalind Giles

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After leaving the opulent surroundings of Changi Airport in Singapore - understandably regarded by many as one of the best in the world - we landed some 10 overnight hours later at Christchurch Airport in New Zealand’s South Island. After Changi, the kindest thing we can say is that it is not the best in the world. It was not helped by fussy immigration staff anxious to establish if I had brought my hiking boots with me (“I take ‘em everywhere mate but clean forgot to bring them today”). They are also extremely sensitive to food/fruit being brought into their country so I had to emphasise that “no I am not smuggling in an excess of mars bars or dog biscuits” although judging by the over excited behaviour of the little immigration dog that kept sniffing our bags, clearly he thought that maybe I had.

After meeting Helen & Dave, at last, we made the short trip into the centre of town and our hotel for the next the 3 nights. It was the first hotel room we had ever stayed in that had an upstairs. Helen in particular was wide eyed at the prospect of having a TV, DVD, room service, microwave, dishwasher and, treasure of treasures, a washing machine!

We set off next day to explore the city and were immediately struck by the many similarities with the UK. The excellent New Zealand Army Band were giving a free open air concert in the square and with tunes like Amazing Grace and Men of Harlech in their repertoire it seemed like we were still at home.

However, the highlight for us was being able to see the kiwi for the first time, albeit in a controlled captive environment. We were led into a small dark viewing area accompanied by a keeper who stayed with us throughout the 10 minutes or so having previously told us not to take pictures, or speak, or move, or cough, or sniff etc etc. We were in front of a glass panel behind which was an area of scrubland resembling the kiwi’s natural habitat. After several minutes when nothing happened, two of these flightless birds appeared out of the gloom and proceeded to move around at lightning speed. We were amazed at how quick they were. With legs like that who needs to fly?

Overall, Christchurch is a fine city that is closely bound to its English roots with Colonial architecture, Gothic Revival buildings, large gardens and parks and even a River Avon running through its centre. Other plusses were the free bus shuttle around the inner areas, quaint old trams (where perhaps to encourage patronage a ticket could be used on successive days) and attractive botanical gardens. The trams had a ding ding bell which the drivers seemed to ring at will. With our hotel being close to Cathedral Junction, it sounded like the alarm clock going off at an unwelcome early hour on the Sunday morning!

But it was time to move on with a hire car. Our request for a manual transmission model was met, although the lady at Apex Cars had to send out a search party to find it amongst the all the automatics. Most New Zealanders are too lazy to change gear themselves she said. We had an old, grey (of course) Nissan Pulsar which promptly declined to start. Not promising we thought. But eventually it sparked into life and, along with Helen, we headed back to the hotel. It took us less than half a minute to take a wrong turn but we shortly made it back where Dave was patiently waiting with all the gear. He had to stand guard with our “equivalent backpacs” which rather resembled suitcases that weighed 20k each.
On asking the hotel receptionist for direction south out of Christchurch, she said she was English too and came from a place called Fishponds in Bristol. We travel 12,500 miles and meet someone that had recently lived just a couple of miles from us. Small world.

We headed south and stopped for lunch at a McDonalds (yes they are everywhere in New Zealand as well). The roads on South Island are largely devoid of other cars - it being possible to drive for miles without seeing another vehicle. The speed limit is about 65 mph but on such empty stretches speed can very addictive and it is easy to get up to 120 without realising it. I hasten to add this is kph not mph. There are also a number of distracting roadside signs warning drivers not get distracted!

All was well until we took a wrong turn at Wanaka. We travelled for several miles believing all was well but when the road became uneven, then became little more than a dirt track, before almost disappearing altogether, it became obvious we were not on State Highway 8.

It was a long drive and our attempts to find a decent radio station failed miserably. We were more than a little surprised to hear one weird song which contained the ‘f’ word and ‘s’ word in the first couple of lines. And this was at midday. Helen was sat in the front passengers seat and quickly changed stations before, as she put it, “mum’s ears start to bleed”.

We reached the Alpine Village of the Mount Cook National Park in the early evening. The weather was fine and clear and the setting was quite stunning. Our chalet/bungalow in part of the famous Hermitage Hotel complex was surrounded on all 4 sides by mountains. Awesome. A meal in the Edmund Hilary Centre was accompanied by a couple of pints of the excellent James Speight Gold Medal Ale which I later discovered has been brewed in Dunedin since 1876. This became a regular meal accompaniment for me over the next couple of weeks. If anyone knows if and where this is available in the UK, I would be delighted to hear from them.

The next day was one to remember. The weather was glorious and the morning was spent with about 10 others on a guided boat trip on Lake Tasman, famous for being one of the few freshwater lakes in the world with icebergs. Despite the balmy temperature there was a thin covering of broken ice in the water and numerous, sizeable icebergs dotted around the entire lake. We were able to pull up alongside several and even break pieces off.

During the late afternoon we arranged a flight in a helicopter from the smallest airport imaginable which took us high up and over Mount Cook and the Fox and Franz Josef Glaciers. It was a first for all of us and we landed on the glacier itself for about 15 minutes. We learned from the pilot that he had been one of the team that was involved with the shooting of the movie The Lord of the Rings. We flew back skirting the west coast. Helen will be starting to save up for a helicopter on her return to the UK- once she has paid off her student loan of course!

The evening was rounded off by a chance to learn about the stars at a 60 minute stargazing session, presented by a local enthusiast. We were able to use 2 powerful telescopes to see some amazing sites in the sky, including the rings of Saturn. Even with the naked eye it was possible to see the Milky Way galaxy amongst the vast array of stars visible in the southern hemisphere.

After a more relaxing next day, we headed off towards Fox Glacier with Helen at the wheel. Although only 20k or so away, we had to make a journey of 400k around the mountains to get there. During our stay at a local Motel that night around 3 inches of rain fell, but despite this Helen and Dave were able to go their planned full day hike up to the Glacier itself. We settled for a more gentile walk around the picturesque Lake Matheson - a very pleasant experience indeed.

Next morning we had about 3 hours to do the 198k north to a somewhat tired looking town called Greymouth where we were due to drop off the car at 12 noon. This seemed time enough until we started encountering numerous triple hairpin bends many of which seemed to be subject to ever ending road works. Ros was rapidly regretting volunteering to drive on this leg. We made it on time (just) and dropped the car off at the local railway station where we were booked on the Tranz Alpine Express back to Christchurch at 13.45.

The conversation at the laid back rep at the Apex Cars drop off point went something like.
“G’day mayte. Any scraitches?”
“No”

“Filled her up?”
“Yes”

“Great, have a g’day mayte.”
“I’ve blocked another car in”

“No worries mayte, they’ll wait, I’ll move it laighter”

The Tranz Alpine Express is regarded as one of the best six train journeys in the world with its four hour journey taking it through the Southern Alps (although the accolade for best journey in 2009 has recently been awarded to the West Highland line in Scotland). In the middle of the train consist is an old guards van converted into an open air viewing vehicle, offering time outside. Although exhilarating it can be quite chilly at these heights, so after short while we returned a little blue about the gills, to the warmth of the carriage.

The train conductor on these trips has the additional task of describing points of interest over the tannoy. On our trip we had Charlie. Now Charlie was clearly not content with just describing the many gorges, viaducts and tunnels as well as history of the route. In addition he regaled us with tongue in cheek musings of his family life, especially his wife’s excessive spending habits. In particular ‘his daughter had twins - never knew where they came from’ after a short pause -the coach was silent waiting for the next comment ‘never had them in our family’ before!’ Followed by a comment that his wife had told him ‘Charlie you keep working the rails and I’ll spend the money.’ Charlie was happy to comply as the family lived with them for a while and work was a welcome relief to the sound of babies crying. He did admit to enjoying being a granddad though. My regular trips between Bristol and Paddington will seem quite dull now.

Some 15 minutes ahead of schedule we crossed the Canterbury Plains and arrived back at Christchurch - just 5 days after we had left it. We were met at our motel for the night by the well apportioned, energetic lady proprietor who resembled a wasp on crack, bouncing around, breezily picking up our cases and announcing that breakfast will be at 5.55am sharp, so that she would have time to drop us back to the station for the next leg of our journey. Our train was due to depart at 7.00am and this so helpful lady insisted that she speak to the station staff to ensure we were given seats on the right hand side of the train to ensure the best views of the Pacific Ocean on the way. This she did.

We were off to Kaikoura, where we were hoping to have a whale of a time. It transpired that we didn’t, as Helen will explain on the next blog.


PS. For reasons you will discover in a later blog, Dave's old mobile number (07800 573149) is no longer active. If you wish to contact him (though I for one can't think of a single reason why...) please e-mail him instead on [e-mail]. Thanks 😊

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