Arrived in Christchurch

Saturday 30^th October 2010

MP3 track of the day: Ash and Smoke - Lord of the rings

Weather: Cloudy start in Lake Tekapo, becoming a beautiful day just as I was leaving for Christchurch (damn). Christchurch had okay weather, quite warm.

Again I was up reasonably early and, breaking with tradition of just staying in my hostel awaiting my coach, the weather was getting better and better and so I headed out with my camera. Yet again I headed to the lake edge, and the church, to take even more photos.

After this I headed back to the hostel, for some lunch, before going to catch my coach. I wasn't the only one catching the coach to Christchurch, an Austrian girl, who I had also met in Te Anau, was going too and so we walked together. Once at the bus stop we both noticed how the weather had improved to be, well, perfect … just as we were about to leave. We both ran to take a quick photo of the beautiful lake in front of us before we left. As we pulled off I was a little annoyed with my fortune with the weather, still I may not have got the best photographing weather but at least I'd seen Lake Tekapo at its best.

The bus ride was pretty uneventful, apart from the diver having to turn around after he had realized he had missed a stop and forgot to pick up a passenger. The driver had the personality of a walnut whip and his commentary was a) dull and 2) sent you to sleep.

I arrived in Christchurch at around 4:30pm and found my hostel with ease. I've broken the tradition here and I'm staying in 'The Coachman Backpackers' hostel rather than the YHA. The main reason is because it's a lot cheaper and … well that's it really. It's a nice hostel set in a really old, traditional, Victorian design building with high ceilings. For once my dorm is full with five, out of the six people, being British (and very nice too) and one being an old native New Zealander (who seems okay).

Once I arrived I chatted a lot to the other English people, due to the fact that they had just come from Asia and they were going around New Zealand and then Fiji; we exchanged notes before I headed to the laundry room. Doing my laundry was as exhilarating as any laundry experience, though secretly I'm still relieved when my clothes come out the same size as when they went in.

I put my washing away and then, finally, I headed out into town to find a convenience store to purchase water and then a take-away fish and chip shop recommend by the hostel. Well the first part went okay but the take-away closed at 7pm (what's the point in that!). I could have spent the next hour roaming the streets hunter-gathering, instead I decided to finished off the food I had left from Lake Tekapo, which evolved more cheese sandwiches, crisps and a little chocolate.

Now I'm just chilling in the common room; there's a good crowd here and it's nice to have quite a number of people around; the last couple of weeks I've been out in the sticks where sheep outnumber people by 2:1. Still, Christchurch seems so big compared to what I've been used to, not sure I'm ready for this city life.

Toodle Pip!