In a world where the city centre is the hub of activity and commerce, Christchurch differs immensely. After the earthquakes 4 years ago the city centre has been pretty much off limits. Everything you now expect is a city is blossoming in the suburbs; malls, cafes, restaurants. It is something that has blown my mind.
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| It used to be a Library |
The first night here I walked into my hostel and started talking to some guys, who just so happened to be from Somerset, just down the road from home. Obviously I joined them for an afternoon of drinking/eating/watching rugby.
Day 2 was probably one of the most nervous days of my life, wasn’t a fan. So I popped out to check out the centre, enjoyed the RE:Start Mall, a shopping centre made entirely from shipping containers. It would appear this is where everyone in the city ended up, watching an affable young man attempt to be a street entertainer. He had some sick skills but there was a little too much talking, so much that I had to leave half way through to get some food. Met a guy from Sydney, chatted the afternoon away then had a wander round Hagley Park. It is a beautiful park, with an exceptional rose garden and a pretty little river with punts and paddle boats on it. Took some pictures of more trees.
In the evening I got the message I had been waiting for and was rudely summoned to act as a chauffeur the next day to go wine tasting, if you can call it that. I collected the 3 lovely ladies (Laura, Lou and Al), they were late so no surprise there, and we drove up a hill and I had my first experience of roads in NZ not exactly being roads, a bridle path stood in the way. We can blame all map reading issues on Laura. She may be the most perfect girl in the world, but damn she can’t read a map! We then went on an adventure to find a vineyard near Akaroa. After using a bar for it's toilet and directions, we snuck out and headed to the right place, called Barry's Bay (what a name). It would appear it's perfectly normal over here to leave your place of work with no one inside, in retrospect we should have had all the wine we could drink and then rang the bell. Janet arrived and it would appear English isn't her first language but she persevered to tell us the history of pretty much everywhere around the vineyard and nothing about the vineyard itself or the wine. So, 4 small glasses of wine, the tiniest pieces of cheese, a game of boules and a lot of major LOLs at Janet later we left French Farm to continue on. We did get to see the second oldest building in New Zealand, made by the French. We then failed to visit 3 more vineyards but did find some lovely wedding venues. The evening was complete watching the sun set over Christchurch eating some BBQ salmon with Tom and Pip.
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| Sunset over Christchurch |
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| JANET!!!! |
The next day was the New Zealand Cup, horse racing that is. Well not exactly horse racing, but horse and cart when the horse can't gallop, only trot. The horse equivalent of the walking at the Olympics; I'm sure it's hard to do but doesn't seem as challenging as beating Usain Bolt. It looked very uncomfortable. Pretty much the entire of the Christchurch teenage population was there trying their hardest to binge drink like the Brits. They ended up stumbling around in their finery and heels. We were lucky enough to glimpse a few slips and stumbles but one girl made our day. She had a little too much to drink, met a nice guy and shared her lipstick with him. It was everywhere, on his nose and all over her face. A nice stranger actually sat down next to her and used a make-up wipe to clean her. Welcome to Christchurch!
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| Chariot racing |
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| Making her look less drunk |
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| Better than looking in a mirror |
After waving goodbye to my first New Zealand friends I found a nice spot to have a pizza, the sunset slightly different to the night before.
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