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Published: November 14th 2007
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Bryan's Ferry
Roxy Music on the road to Christchurch It was with some reluctance that we left Dunedin. I really liked the place, it had a real old city type vibe and some of the architecture was fantastic, very reminiscent of London in places.
We had got our days wrong slightly, the original plan was to break the journey from Dunedin to Christchurch in two. Then we realised that there was only two nights left. Oh well.
We stopped in Timaru for an hour or so to let the girls have a play in the park. Although Chloe and I had as much fun as they did!!! We also had ice creams. Aisha was chuffed to bits with the chocolate covered mr. whippy that she got. Stickier than sticky the stick insect.
When we came in to the city Chloe directed me towards a road with loads of motels. Then saw a picture of a place called Camelot and decided that we should stay there. We arrived to find it hugely expensive but also enormous in the cottage/lodge. What the hell we were in front of our budget for NZ and it was our last two days on the island. Check it out at http://www.camelot.co.nz/
After chilling for a couple
of hours we went to willowbank. It is a kiwi/ wildlife sanctuary that also runs Kotane, the maori experience.
We got there 10 minutes before the maori tour and show started. We were guided around by a female maori who explained a bit about the maori lifestyle and beliefs. Then guided us through the reserve giving maori explanations of what the trees, plants and animals were used for. Part way around we were "ambushed" by the local village people. They gave us a show of the traditional way of finding out if the intruders were friend or foe. After being led to the village the chief talked to us in maori, as he would have done before the island was populated by europeans, and it was translated by our guide. The final part of the tour was a show. This consisted of some song and dance. There was also some audience participation. The girls got up to do a dance with some poi, and I got up and did a bit of shouting, stomping and tounge wiggling. The chief was reminicent of Gene Simmons, bet he had a happy wife!!!!!!!!!!!!
After this we got another tour of the wildlife reserve
Mt Somers
Taken through Chloe's sunnies and shown some more animals. When we were in Franz Josef we had been told that we would see kea and how destructive and clever they can be, but we didn't see any there. There were some here. I can personally testify that they have very sharp beaks and are extremely clever and dexterous. Little gits kept bitting my hand when I wasn't looking. We then went in to the nocturnal enclosure to see the kiwis. Funny little buggers. The feeling of seeing them was akin to seeing the penguins or the dolphins, both absolutely wonderous animals. You can watch them on tv and think that they are great but when you see them in the flesh it is somehow different. After seeing them you feel somehow inflated and happy yet very humbled. I tried to take photo's but the camera didn't know what to focus on so most of them didn't come out or were blurry.
The next day we had a lazy morning. I wanted to go jet boating. It was one of three thing that I had wanted to do since being in New Zealand, the other two being mountain biking and motorcross/quad biking. We never seemed
to have the time to do the other two.
I rang the Waimak alpine jet boating people and were told that we could do a half hour ride later in the day if we could get ourselves there for 2pm. They couldn't do any longer as they had two bus loads of Japanese tourist coming. Just don't start me on how much I dislike your average Japanese tourist. Although I spoke to a nice couple on the flight to Austrialia.
So we drove to Springfield to go and get on the boat. We are still amused by the place names. We drove through or near Aylesbury, Oxford, St. Albans and quite a lot of other English towns. Aylesbury amused me most as there was only a cattery there.
We were a little late arriving at the boat and were told by Greg, our driver that we were in the fastest boat in the float and that to get to the return point back in time he would have to go flat out most of the way. We got kitted out in windbreaker jackets and lifejackets, given the safety talk and then off we went.
The boat seats approx. 25 people
will run in as little at 1.5 inches of water, but only for short periods. It really needs 3 inches of water to run without destroying the bottom of the boat. The water is sucked in from under the front of the boat and squirted out of a 3 inch dia hole in the back at 500 litres per second.
The boat, because of the jet, is increadibly manouverable. I can only describe as like a 4wd vehicle on gravel. The thing slides around all over the place but our pilot seemed to get really close to the rocks without trying to hard. We weren't sure if that was the protocol or he was trying to scare us. He certainly didn't succeed in scaring us cos everyone was grinning inanley.
After driving back to Christchurch we parked inthe centre of the city and went for a wander. We ended up in the cathedral square where Ellie was insistant that we watch the large size chess match going on. We convinced her to get on the tram. The tram stopped operating in Christchurch in the mid 50's. It has been resurected and was absolutely great. The journey around the centre of
the city takes 25 minutes and is interspersed with comedic repartee from the driver. Love the place, it is very reminiscent of Oxford with punting and the schools/colleges.
We then drove out of the city centre and after getting slightly lost we ended up near the hotel and decided to stop for dinner. We are both being crap as we can't remember the place or the name of the restaurant. It was Italian though, the food was that good I even left a $10 tip.
The following morning Chloe wanted to go to New Brighton and see the pier. Great beach, long pier and good park next to the pier.
When we got to the airport we wanted a G&T. Couldn't find any tonic so we bought a litre bottle of bombay saphire instead. When we got on the plane they had gin so we both had G&T's.
Arrived in Sydney safe and sound then caught our connecting flight to Brisbane. Now staying with my sister, near the gold coast south of brisbane, for the week.
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Bryan
non-member comment
Yeah, I ghot a ferry!