A Walk in the Woods

It's been an emotional few days as we bid farewell to New Zealand and begin our journey home... and NZ said goodbye to their cricket World Cup dreams too.

We travelled from Fox Glacier up the west coast to a place called Hokitika, which describes itself as the "cool little town". There was certainly something quirky about the place, which had its heyday in the late 19th century when they discovered that there was gold in "them there hills" and greenstone in the rivers. There is still gold to be found if know where to look (not a clue) and have vast quantities of dredging equipment at your disposal (which we didn't). Greenstone (also known as jade or pounamu) is now protected and can only be collected by those with a direct link to the local Maori who lived in the area before European settlement. Hokitika also happens to be the setting of The Lumineries by Eleanor Catton, which you may have read. I'm working my way through it on Audible.

Given we couldn't make our fortune from a lucky gold or greenstone find, we decided to do some exploring instead. Hokitika seemed to be an ideal place for enjoying a few of life's simple pleasures: walking on the beach and investigating the driftwood, skimming stones in the river, watching the sunset and eating of course - the pizza from Fat Pipi's is highly recommended! We were particularly successful at skimming stones too... it must be something about glacial rock flour in the river water. We didn't manage to add another round of crazy golf - no course in Hokitika - but I did secure victory in the whitebait game at the slightly eccentric but interesting local museum.

I also enjoyed exploring some of Hokitika's new and old craft shops - as well as greenstone and gold, glass blowing, photography, sculpting, wood carving and sock making are just some of the crafts on show. If sock making is your thing, there is actual a sock museum with a display of vintage sock-making machines. I popped in but decided quickly that sock making wasn't my thing and moved on to the next craft!

Hokitika also gave us the chance to get close to NZ's most famous non-flying bird, the Kiwi, with a visit to a nocturnal house and wildlife centre. Despite three previous visits to NZ, this was the first time I'd actually seen kiwi - I think I optimistically hoped that at some point I'd encounter one in the wild (highly unlikely). The place we visited had two kiwi, who were being prepared for release into the wild in a few months time. Once our eyes adjusted to the darkness, it was great to watch these slighltly absurd looking birds scurry about in their forest-like environment and they were actually much noisier than I'd expected. We also got to see giant eels, which Jon had the chance to feed, and had a go at catching crayfish - we were pretty hopeless! A glow worm dell across the road from our beachside accommodation provided an interesting diversion too.

We woke up early on Friday to catch our flight to Christchurch. As we walked out to the airport - it was only about 15 minutes - the sky was bright and clear and gave us a clear view down the coast and into the mountains. After the frustrations of Lake Matheson, Mount Cook and Mount Tasman were both clearly if distantly in view. However, the clear skies over Mount Cook didn't translate to Christchurch - the airport was fogged in and no planes were landing or departing. The flight before ours was cancelled and passengers offered the chance of road transport. We were a bit worried, but in the end our flight left just 15 minutes late and we had a scenic flight over the Southern Alps with fantastic views all the way, landing in Christchurch to clearing skies and a sunny afternoon.

Our earlier few days in Christchurch were mostly filled with watching cricket - England actually won both games we saw - and we didn't have much time to explore anything more than Hagley Park. We started our return visit with a lovely lunch in Ballentyne's Tea Rooms (think Betty's meets John Lewis), before wandering up through the Re:start Mall, a shopping and cafe area created out of shipping containers in just one of the city centre areas where the February 2011 earthquake did most damage. We later visited an exhibition called Quake City, where we learned that over 1,000 buildings in the central city area were damaged and will ultimately be demolished. Some are already being re-built, others have been dismantled brick by brick. Some still lie in ruins, as the city works out what to do with them and also has experienced thousands of aftershocks in the last four years. There were pop-up green spaces, parks, cafes, street art and exhibitions at a few of the demolished sites, part of a city-wide scheme called "greening the rubble" which I thought was really innovative. 

There is an ambitious plan for the total redevelopment of the city, with lots more green spaces and fewer tall buildings, but it will be a while before this is finished. The Arts Centre and Art Gallery (above, bottom right picture) were two of my favourite places from my 2004 visit - both are due to reopen soon. The future of the badly damaged cathedral is still undecided, although the temporary "cardboard cathedral" has become a significant visitor attraction. The Quake City exhibition included the story of one lady who was rescued from the collapsed tower of the cathedral and created the quilt below to tell the story of the earthquakes and also looking towards a better future. Not quite visible in the photo are 185 tiny white crosses to commemorate those who were killed in February 2011. Another poignant monument was 185 white chairs of all shapes, sizes and styles situated on a vacant lot - the city is still healing and remembering.

On Saturday, we finally made it to another parkrun and celebrated our Southern Hemisphere PBs with lots of post-run cake. We also caught up with Andy, who'd been up with early bird and captured a new 5k PB. He's hoping to help set up another parkrun in the South Island very soon... we might not make it to the inaugural Timaru parkrun but we'll aim to be back for the first birthday celebrations. We celebrated our PBs with cakes after parkrun at the cafe in the Botanic Gardens and sliders delivered by pneumatic tube for tea later!

In between food stops, we also found time to explore the Canterbury Museum, an eclectic mix of pre-history, geology, social history, settler stories, environmental issues, Antarctic exploration, fashion, shoes, the age of the t-shirt, tourism and random collections of kiwiana, including a house decorated almost entirely with paua shells. I think Jon would still be in the Antarctic exhibition if he hadn't got hungry. He was pleased to find some "made in Stoke-on-Trent" pottery on display too. My favourite exhibition included original art work used to encourage tourism in NZ in times gone by... "Carefree Holidays" sound good to me!

On Sunday afternoon, the streets emptied and seemingly all of NZ was glued to the Cricket World Cup final... It was so quiet out and about and we decided to cheer on the Black Caps too. Unfortunately, there wasn't the dream finish our holiday hosts were hoping for... we could definitely empathise with a crushing defeat to Australia.

Cricket over, we continued our Antarctic theme with a trip out to Lyttelton on Monday, the port from where Shackleton and Scott set sail for their Antarctic adventures. Much of Lyttelton was also damaged in the 2011 earthquake, as it was very close to the epicentre. However, the town is recovering slowly and there were some really quirky bars and cafes created from shipping containers, as well as a community food-share garden and photos of old Lyttelton displayed amongst the rubble. Back in the city, we decided to have one last walk in the woods, getting lost for a little while in the very lovely New Zealand icons garden at the Botanic Gardens and being amazed at this fine specimen... not sure what it is, but it looked good.

Having checked out of our hotel in central Christchurch early on Tuesday morning, we then headed out to the Antarctic Centre close to the airport... I think Jon is a bit worried that I'm planning our next holidays to a very cold location! We did a behind the scenes tour of the little blue penguin sanctuary - all the penguins have been rescued after being injured by human and/or animal predators. We met Turko, who'd been injured by a collision with a fishing boat, and Bagpipes, named by the Scottish vet who treated him. I love penguins!

Apart from the penguins, the centre is devoted to explaining the history, geography and environmental challenges of Antarctic exploration. There is a cold room, where we experienced a wind storm with the temperatures dropping to -18C and took silly photos. 

Jon managed to hold his hand in an "Antarctic" pool for 1 minute and 2 seconds. I lasted just 17 seconds. We went for a ride on a Haggelund - an all terrain vehicle used in the Antarctic - and tested out whether it really could stay upright on a side slope of 31 degrees and float through a puddle. Thankfully, it could, although I did keep looking down at my feet to find out if water was coming in under the door as the water level crept up to the window. We experienced an Antarctic voyage in the "4D cinema" - getting wet was inevitably part of it - and walked through an ice cave. We travelled in Scott's footsteps and saw the beauty of the Southern Lights. I dressed up like an Antarctic explorer and rode on a sled. There was even a snowfall. It was a really fun way to spend our last day in NZ... and I'm definitely going to find out about Antarctic travel when we get home!!!

And so that's it, we're at our airport hotel and have just a few hours left in New Zealand - our flight to Adelaide via Sydney leaves at 6.45am. That's an early alarm call. It's a sad moment - we've had an amazing two months in NZ and found many more reasons to love this special place. 

Happy Travels

Liz T