New Zealand Part 1: Christchurch and Kaikoura

 After Singapore, our next destination was New Zealand! This was something I'd been looking forward to, as it promised to be a mountain lover's dream. 

We spent the first three days in Christchurch, exploring the city and catching up on sleep after our long flights. Our first full day, we walked around the city and ran some errands. We had to print off our taxes so we went to the public library which was very fancy and had a rooftop garden. 

We then had to post our taxes, so we went in search of a post office. We found a booth in a chemist and sent them off, so we don't have to worry about them any more for this year. Errands complete, we grabbed some lunch in a little shopping centre and then continued on exploring the city. There isn't a lot to see in the city centre itself, but we did find a very busy market food hall which we earmarked for dinner. We did get some milkshakes and take them down to the river to drink.

There was a nice river walk which bordered the city and we followed this for a little while. We sat and read for a while on a bench and then turned back for dinner which was from a Mexican stand in the Riverside market. 

On Sunday, we met up with our friend Laura we met in California (who is also from the UK). She'd moved to New Zealand for work and by now knows all the good places to visit. She took us to the seaside and we did a coastal walk where we saw some great views of the bay and a few sheep. 

We then went for brunch, which is apparently a really big thing here, and then to a beach spot. We went for a little paddle, but it was so cold!

For our final full day in Christchurch, we went to go and visit the Red Zone. This was an area of the city that suffered from earthquakes a few years ago and the ground was so destroyed, the plumbing and pipes were completely irreparable and the government ordered everyone to leave and tore down the houses. What's left is some unmaintained roads and pavements, wireless pylons, and big squares of grass surrounded by borders of trees and shrubs. It's slowly becoming a park, but you can still see the signs that it used to be a neighbourhood. 

After this we hopped on the bus to the other side of the city to go and see the botanic gardens. It was very hot this day, so once we arrived we went straight to the cafe and got some iced tea. 

The gardens were very nice and more like an area of a giant park than a gardens with a gate and borders. We walked through the New Zealand garden to learn some more about the native plants and sat by the lake to watch the ducks. 

The next morning, we were off on our roadtrip! We picked up the car and set off on the road. We stopped to get a sandwich on the way, and arrived in Kaikōura just in time to eat it. It was raining on the way, but it stopped long enough for us to eat our lunch. However, when we decided to take a walk to visit the seal colony along the coast, it started to rain and just got heavier and heavier! We did manage to see a lot of seals and very close, but we got absolutely soaked through. (This was Tuesday and I couldn't wear my shoes again until Monday!)

That evening, we checked into our hostel and made some dinner. It was very cosy and even had a fire going in the common room to keep us warm in the damp weather. The roof did start to leak just as we were going to bed, but as a group we decided to put a bowl underneath and call it a night until a member of staff would be back in the morning. 

In the morning it was still raining, so we abandoned a half cooked idea of visiting the seals again and went straight to our next destination. This trip was about 4 hours long, so we stopped in the town on Nelson on our way (which of all the towns we visited seemed to be the least touristy) and arrived in the afternoon at Mārahau. Our home for the night was a tiny cabin in the campground and was very cute and cosy. They had a separate shower block and a big kitchen we used to heat up our leftovers from the night before. 

Before dinner though, we took a walk around the campsite and a little way onto the coastal trail. We saw tiny crabs running into their holes in the sand and lots of weka birds. 

After our cosy night in, we took the water taxi out to Torrent Bay. We got to see the coastline from a whole different perspective and it meant we only had to walk one way on the trail. It was a very pretty trail which started on one beach, went over a lagoon, then went through trees to Cleopatra's pool, to another beach, and then finally went upwards so we had views of the bays below before arriving back to camp. At one point we were followed for a while by a New Zealand Fantail, they appear to be very friendly little birds!

It was a really great walk, but very long and tiring. We had gotten the 9am boat out, but didn't make it back until 4:30pm. Once back at the car, we had to start driving as it was 3 hours to our next destination and we had a phone call arranged.

Read on in part 2...