Christchurch - Kaikoura

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Friday 12th November

We leave Lake Tekapo in the glorious sunshine and drive about a mile around the lake until we arrive at a nice little church called the Church of the Good Shepard. The church is arguably one of the most photographed in New Zealand, and features an altar window that frames stunning views of the lake and mountains.
Next to here is a bronze statue of a dog which was erected as a tribute to the dogs that have helped the shepherd's through the years. A well know shepherd got lost in the snow one year and when they found his dead body weeks later they also found lots of dead rabbits by his body along with his still alive dog. The dog had tried to help his master which showed how loyal these dogs were to their owners. Its a fitting tribute that they erected this statue in honour of Shepherds dogs all over NZ.

Christchurch (pop 380,000) is the largest city in the South Island of New Zealand. The city was named by the Canterbury Association, which settled the surrounding province of Canterbury. The river that flows through the city is called the Avon and the city has many British influences within the city center.

On 4 September 2010, a major 7.1 magnitude earthquake struck Christchurch at 4:35 am local time with the epic center of the quake only being 40 km away and 10 km deep. The earthquake was reported to have caused widespread damage and power outages. 63 aftershocks were also reported in the first 48 hours with three registering 5.2 magnitude. Amazingly there were no deaths caused by the quake which is due to the early time it occured, had it been 9am or 5pm then it wouldve be much worse! There are estimated to be 14,000 earthquakes a year in NZ alone of which 200 can be felt by residents on the surface!

The sun’s really beating down now and we just want to get to our hostel and unpack as we’ve booked a private room for three days and really need to catch up on laundry and internet stuff.

As we drive down Manchester Street we see some of the devastation caused by the recent earthquake as some buildings have large cracks on the masonry whereas others have collapsed walls. There is the odd cleared area where a building once stood as they have pulled a lot of unsafe buildings down and cleared the ground. It’s a shame as it’s the older buildings that suffer as most newer buildings in Christchurch got quake proofed when they were built. Disco tells us its mostly the residential houses in the suburbs that got hit the worst, especially the ones built on a certain direction relating to the fault line.

We arrive at our YHA and its fine. We went out with our friend Alayna from Russia for dinner and we ended up in an irish bar having fish and chips which were yummy. As we leave the bar we all comment on how warm it is even at 10pm and we pass a police cabin in the square which has a digital thermometer reading of 23oC.

Walking around Christchurch at night was pretty cool as its got trendy bars mixed in with nice cafes and restaurants along Oxford terrace wouldn’t be out of place in the UK such are the influences and styles of the roads and buildings. Tomorrow we will properly do a walking tour of the city and hopefully meet up with an old friend, Cliffy from Lossiemouth who been living here for 5 years and I haven’t seen him for nearly 12 years so it will good to see him. We have been in touch over the last few months so we’ll meet at some point.

Great, we go to bed without having to worry about an early start and a long lie is on the cards providing theres no earthquakes during the night.

Saturday 13th November

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Well the buildingis still intact when we awake around 10am and we are fighting fit again and ready to haul out and explore Chrstchurch but first a big breakfast!

The weather is extraordinarily hot today which is unusual for the end of spring, beginning of summer but we are not complaining as we are heading for the Botanical Gardens. We stop and have a seat just before the Rose Garden and bask in the hot sun for a hour or so. The smells of flowers and pollen fill the air and there’s all sorts of birds and insects buzzing around which is totally relaxing and calming on the soul, just what we needed after a crazy week of adventures. When we eventually stretch the legs and get moving we walk around the beautiful meandering Avon river that encircles the park. Lots of people are out walking their dogs and some are having a jog around the park on their work lunch break!! Now we realised why Christchurch is referred to as the garden city as even around the built up areas in the city center there are an abundance of flowers and trees.

We take a quick visit to the Bonsai Garden before heading around for the exit by the museums. The art museum was on the list of things to visit but it was far to busy so we gave it a miss and headed for the outside markets just down the road. There is a nice mix of old buildings with new modern ones and they just about get away with it. More churches and also the university buildings are being propped up with Steel girders as they too have suffered from the recent quakes but the will survive at a major cost. The local council have made a lot of enemies within the city as sometimes its more cost effective just to pull a building down rather than repair and this has upset some locals who have seen local churches and historic buildings vanish.

We venture into the shopping areas where Jill and I part company as Im off to see a car rally show in the city square and Jill wants to go shopping. It’s a fair deal as it nice to have a break from each other now and then as we’ve been living in each others pockets for long periods of time since we left Aberdeen.

The car rally show was ok, a lot of old Fords and Nissans on display aswell as a couple of newer cars such as a ford focus Rs. Its getting a bit too hot for me so I slowly head back to our digs to phone my mate Cliffy to arrange our meet for tonight. We arranged to meet at a place called The Bog which is a bar beside Oxford Terrace next to the Memorial Bridge.

We have dinner and headed off to meet Cliffy and it was good to see him and its pretty cool to get insider information about New Zealand. We had a good catch up and then we all headed deeper into town for a right knee’s up and watched the deciding rugby league match between the All Blacks and Australia which added to the atmosphere.
The All blacks snatched a late win in the dying stages of the match and the whole place erupted and Maori chants could be heard well into the night.
We stotted off home around midnight and thought our night was over as we got ready for bed but something bizarre happened. I thought it was the drink but our room was shaking and as I lay on my bed I swore Jill was kicking my bed when she shouted at me to get up, get up! We are caught in an earthquake aftershock! Wow, I feel the weightlessness feeling for about 30 seconds and the trembling and rattling noises were uncanny as it lasted for 60 seconds then it subsided with the odd vibration lasting another few minutes. Experience an Earthquake……Tick!!

Sunday 14th November

Well the earth moved only once in the night i hate to say. 😊 We read on the internet that a 4.7 magnitude tremor had hit town 9km below the surface and no damage done to any buildings or anyone which was a relief.
During the mid morning another tremor rumbled by but it wasn’t as severe as the one before but I could sense the movement and it didn’t help the hangover one little bit! It kind of plays on your mind wondering if a big one is going to hit!

We spent all day organising our next ten days and booking things in advance as the hostels are getting busy as hell now that the summer season is approaching.

I cooked dinner for four of us tonight as its Alayna’s last day before she heads back to Moscow and a dutch girl, Mellisa, is joining us for a bite as she too has been on our bus since last week.
Alayna surprised us when she came down for tea as she was wearing a T-shirt that bore the words ’Proud to be born on St Andrews day’! I asked if she was and she replied yeah I was born on the 30th of November. Cool as bits!
Nice and easy chicken Korma for dinner over discussions about Australia as Mellisa and Alayna have both done a few months there before New Zealand so its good to get travel tips from them. Alayna gave us two minature Russian doll keyrings as presents which was sweet as. She has worked in Edinburgh a few times and even has a St Andrews Badge sewn onto her rucksack which explains the T-Shirt. We will miss her but promise to keep in touch through facebook.

As we started to clear the table and tidy up we were hit with a larger tremor than the night before, this time magnitude 4.9! The kitchen rattled and the fridges creaked and you feel like you’ve got no control of your legs for a few seconds, it’s a very strange feeling. Everyone just looks as each other and smiles as if its no big deal. Its part and parcel of life in Christchurch and I guess you get used to living with it. We head off tomorrow so we get laundry washed, blogs typed up and repack our bags before crashing out on our twin beds.

Monday 15th November

We are heading for Kaikoura today which is up the northeast of the south island. We have a new driver who takes us up the coastal road and explains some history of the area‘s surrounding us. Its thankfully a quick journey up to Kaikoura and the weather is a bit grey when we arrive but we still manage to see some seal’s coming ashore aswell as some Albatross’s flying gracefully on the coastal wind above us.

It’s a nice little YHA here and I have a hour to get myself into some warmer clothes as Im off to do a spot of fishing and help to land some Crayfish.
The Irish couple that have been travelling with us join me with another couple from Ireland from another hostel. So the five of us are picked up in a 4x4 truck towing a large 24ft fishing vessel behind it and we head for the harbour through town and across the bay.
The owner of the boat is Tommo and his sister, sue, is the deckhand who is learning to do her skipper certificate. They are both really nice and friendly and down to earth and we all got on together from the off.

Once the boat has been launched its swung around into the nearby pier and we all hop on. Donal already looks pale and I foresee sea sickness as he’s gone pure white within 5 minutes of us leaving the harbour. It is quite choppy out here but nothing major and its actually gets calmer once we arrive at our first Crayfish pot which I help Sue hoist up using the Motorised winch.
We got 3 large Crayfish and I was amazed at Sue’s strength as she hauls the pot to one side, rebaits in and chucks it back into the ocean like it was made of paper! We are off towards the next Buoy marking our pot and we haul this one up with more success, four more Crays. Two more pots to go and we are fairly zipping around the sea bay with the waves almost crashing over the bow.
Donal has chucked his guts over the side twice now and is ordered below deck and covered in a blanket to try and keep him warm. Shame.
The next Pot only had one large crayfish in it who was a stubborn boy coming out the pot as he was gripping on tight with his pinchers. He’s no match for our Sue as she hauls him out and into the container which was now teaming with Crays. Our last pot hit the jackkpot as there were around 8 or 9 crays in it some of which were small but nevertheless they go into the container to be measured later.

We head off across the bay and into the next bay to head for our fishing spot in which Tommo locates using his Sonar. For the next twenty or so minutes Tommo shows us how to tell male crays from females and also how to use the measuring tool which indicates which ones are ‘keeper’ or a ‘thrower’.
Basically crays are measured from the distance between the bones on their tails. You measure between the 2nd last two tail bones and for male crays they must be at least 54mm and 60mm for females, any smaller than this are thrown back into the sea. Also if a female has eggs under her last two fins under her legs she too will get placed back into the sea. Male crays don’t have large dark fins covering the underneath of their tails whereas the females do as it’s the fins that protects the eggs. All interesting stuff as Crayfish as cousins of our native Lobster but smaller and its cool to see the comparisons.

Its time to start fishing! We all get a large sea rod each which has a long tracer with two large hooks for bait. We bait up the hooks using fish meat and plonk the line into the water with a large (3oz) weight and the weight do the work as it drags your line 100 metres to the sea bed. Once the line stops you click the reel tight and haul it up a couple of turns an wait. We will be mainly catching Sea Perch or if we are lucky blue or red cod. So there’s two of us on each side wsith rodseach and the portside nail about five fish in quick succession. Now the competiton is on as I reel in two fish in. ‘Portside 5-2 Starboard! I yell. Come on fishies!

All around us there’s large Albatrosses and Sea birds all waiting for scraps and if your not quick they will take the fish right off your line. Tommo throws the smaller fish back into the sea to which causes a feeding frenzy amongst the birds. The Albatross are truly beautiful birds and they are huge as they have more than 3 metre long wing spans and their body size is that of a decent sized dog!

Back to the score and Portside are whopping our butts 16 - 6 now but we are only halfway through and we all raise lines and move to another spot. We get free coffee and buscuits we is a treat as its quite chilly out here in the Pacific Ocean. We fish for another hour and the number of fish being brought aboard is unbelievable and they are put in the center table sink where Sue cuts and fillets the meat from the bone and bags them up whilst keeping the leftover carcass for Crayfish bait for tomorrow.

When we call it a day the Portside easily romped it 28 fish to 20 but it was great fun and we all had big smiles on our faces.
When we got back ashore I helped clean the boat out which didn’t take long and we were all given 2 Crayfish each and a bag of freshly filleted Sea Perch. Excellent value for money at £35 pounds each for 2 and half hours fishing plus the fishmeat and Crays. I cant wait to get back to the hostel and get these cooked up, hardly the staple diet of a backpacker but ill take it!

I Chucked the Crays into the freezer to humanely knock them out as Im already feeling bad about launching them into the pot of boiling water. Whilst they are freezing im cooking up a Mornay sauce to go with the White fish and Jill’s helping me by making the mash tatties. Time for the plunge boys!! Sploosh, in they go and the lid shut so I don’t have to look into their eyes while they turn a lovely pink!

The evils im getting from some German men sitting behind me is burning into the back of my head not to mention the veggie heads in the kitchen from Holland who are tutting and sighing while they stir their pasta on the next stove. Its not my fault the gas cooker has run out of gas or else I would’ve kept out of everyone’s way over in the corner. The joys of communial kitchens!!

So as you can imagine the serving of the Fish and Crayfish was getting over elaborate and our Irish pals were joining us for tea tonight as I was cooking their cray’s too and shared our fish with them in return for them getting the beers. They also helped in and setting a grand looking table!!! Backpackers.. Us? Not for the next 2 hours we aint!
The crayfish was really fine although the smaller ones were slightly overcooked but tasted lush. The sea perch tasted like haddock and was really fine. It was nice sitting here by the large windows looking out to sea as we could see the snow topped mountains in the distance poking through the clouds.
We head back to Picton tomorrow to catch our return ferry back to Wellington so its a fitting way to spend our last night in the beautiful south Island of New Zealand!!

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Comments

[FRED BARTLETT]

Our news for a change
Thanks for another interesting blog, the more you write the more I am falling under the NZ spell, I just love Crayfish and Lobster, prefer it cold. Finally after months of tests and cameras up the bum and down the throat we have a diagnosis, as well as a neat new line in blow jobs as seen from the inside $1 each. He has become intolerent to gluten, apparantly it is be comming more common, and can be dangerous and difficult to spot, no treatment, just very careful diet and much relief at knowing, so now a new way of eating begins. Love to both Fred