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Published: April 16th 2009
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View from outside our window First of all: the Edema is much better! Elevating my feet while I slept last night and walking all day helped it.
Today we fit so much into our day, it's hard to believe. First I got to take a shower which was badly needed and much appreciated. Then we went downstairs for breakfast and we were completely surprised to find that this B & B operated like a restaurant! Most of it was self-serve, with a fruit bar that had at least 10 different tubs of fruit salads and yogurt. Then there was an oatmeal bar, a toast table, juice/coffee/tea table, cereal bar, and then a woman came out of the kitchen to take your hot-order! You could have eggs with the following sides: baked beans, SPAGHETTI, creamed corn, bacon, sausage, and fire-roasted tomatoes (pronounced toe-MAH-toes). The family dog is an 11-year-old female Dachsund named Winnie (pronounced wIn-AY), who was so sweet and waited until someone accidentally or purposefully dropped something. Luckily for her a child at another table did just that. 😊
After breakfast we walked around downtown and found a neat little shopping centre selling gifts made locally and we found several treasures. After that we
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Breakfast sign in our B&B found the Christchurch Cathedral and it was gorgeous...although too big and dim-lit to get a good picture inside. We walked up the tower which has about 130 steps in a spiral staircase and the end of the trip is basically two vertical ladders...beautiful view from the top but we both got very dizzy on the way back down.
After shopping downtown we took a 4-hour van-tour of the city along with two people from Texas and one from India. This was a VERY valuable tour! We learned some of the history of the city, got some great pictures, and got a few chances to exit the van and explore a bit. We walked through Mona Vale Gardens and found a beautiful rose garden and a fernery! We drove through the University of Canterbury which is expanding rapidly due to the growing demand for higher education. The city is mostly populating the valley between some mountains and the side of one of the mountains. As we arrived at the top of the largest mountain and were walking around taking pictures, we learned it is actually a volcano. My mother didn't like this very much... I was thrilled! We had tea
on the top of the volcano in a restaurant called Sign of the Takahe. We saw many homes which all had different privacy fences. We never saw one without one. The trees here are changing since this is the start of their fall so everything is beautiful! There are parking lots here called Car Parks which have surrounding mounds of earth covered in grass to hide them from view from the road. I went on a mini-rock climbing adventure on some volcanic rock called Cave Rock. Got some great pictures of the sunset and the Pacific ocean from it. We learned about Quail island which used to be where they quarantined animals that first arrived in the country to avoid spreading disease since NZ largely relies on their agricultural industry.
We ate dinner at the Belgian Beer Cafe. I had roasted red pepper soup and salad and my mom had mussels (2.2 lbs of them! she would like me to add that the 2.2 lbs includes the shells...). The pop over here tastes really different from what we're used to. My mom had a Belgian beer that she thought was delicious! The diet coke tastes like regular cherry coke
to me...which makes me (ED) nervous, but oh well. Our waiter was from Minnessotta! He came over here 6 years ago for a study abroad, found a girl, married, and never left!
Translations/Hilarity:
"Slippery when frosty" (we don't have the equivalent in Michigan because people KNOW it's slippery when icy. Or at least they should know.)
"Works End" ("Construction Ends")
"they grit the hills" ("they sand the hills" in the Winter instead of using salt)
"Nor'Wester" (instead of our Nor'Easters!)
"No worries, cheers!" (I already say no worries!!! Maybe I was MEANT to be in NZ!)
Mom found a street called Pervert St.
"undercover" ("covered" as in, the stadium is covered)
One of the large rocks (boulder, even), was called Shag Rock
I must have been called mate 3248239 times today.
Cheers!
Ashley
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I thought I'd add a few things, but there isn't much because Ashley has done such a great job describing our days so far! The ride here was truly horrendous. Dave & Denice, we learned that beginning July 1, there will be a direct Qantas (I keep wanting to add a u after
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Sculpture of all of the leaves in the country the Q, but there isn't one) flight from Metro to Sydney. We learned today we should have worn TED hose, and will try to buy some for the trip home. The problem we've run into here is it's so difficult finding stores that sell things you want. It took several stops before we found cough syrup and a box of Kleenex. We still haven't found the converter/adaptor we need for our appliances.
At the rose garden today, our guide said that the city pays someone to come in to deheed the roses. We finally figured out he was saying "de-head" the roses. The color red is pronounced "reed."
At the Sign of the Takahe restaurant, which was beautiful had a rather strange odor as it was made of castle stone, we learned it was thought the Takahe bird was extinct until they were rediscovered in the 1950's in some remote area of New Zealand and nurtured back into a thriving existence. Unlike the poor Moa!
The entire population of New Zealand is 15 percent Maori, the original settlers from Polynesia. However, only 3 percent live in the South Island. They have extended fishing rights as do Native
Americans, but on a more limited basis. They are generally the lower wage earners, less educated, etc. That is changing, but slowly.
We pick up the car tomorrow or the next day - not sure exactly when. Gas here is $1.589 per litre, but since that's in NZ money, I have no idea how much per gallon we'll be paying. We saw lots of oil derricks today, but I imagine they import gas as we do. They export lots of timber to Japan & Korea.
Nancy
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Kortni
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I'm so glad to see your reppin' Michigan down there!! Run in to any alumni yet? I'm glad your tootsies shrunk back up :-). How long are you guys at the bed and breakfast for?