Christchurch Redux

Last night when we arrived there was no parking left in the hotel’s little lot that we thought we could fit our large SUV into.  So we parked it on the street and paid the hour that was left on the street parking with the plan that we would move it first thing this morning.  I went outside this morning so I could report back to Gayle if there was a space available in the parking lot.  We have a large car by New Zealand standards and we have had to park in some tight spots.  Gayle directs while I freak out that I’m going to hit a car.  This morning I decided to overcome my fear and just park the damn car in a tight spot all by myself.  I managed with only one bad interaction with a curb.

I enjoyed my muesli and croissant in the common room of the hotel before heading out to have some adventures.  Gayle stayed behind to rest and save herself for tonight’s rugby game.  We are hoping to minimize her steps.

I asked the woman at reception if I would get a better view of Christchurch and the bay if I rode the gondola or the chairlift. She said, “We don’t have a chairlift.”  Actually, they do have a chairlift.  So I decided to do both of them today and see which one has a better view.  I started with the gondola.  

There is a lovely view in every direction.

You can walk out as far as you dare on this ridge.  

Hang gliders are everywhere.

Sheep dot the hillside.

I spotted the stadium Gayle and I will be going to tonight, with the Southern Alps above it.

I headed over to the Christchurch Adventure Park Chairlift.  It exists for mountain bikers to get their bikes to the top of the hill and ride down.  My Uber driver told me he did it once and he would never dirt bike down the mountain again.  When I arrived I headed for the bathrooms and laughed when I saw that only one is designated for women.  I have entered a man’s world.

Every other chair lift is actually a bike lift.  

The ride up was beautiful.  It was so still. 

Signs dotted the hillside warning of the danger of mountain biking.

Most of the bikers were boys between the ages of 12-16, although there were younger and older people. I only saw one female biker. The bikes were taken up on the lift just ahead of their riders.  As soon as the riders hit the top of the hill they would leap off the chair with their helmets already on, grab the bikes and head off.  

A sign at the top told them which trails were open and which were closed.

I don’t know if this photo gives you enough perspective to see just how treacherous the trail was in spots.

But I had come for the view and it was glorious.  I can’t tell you which one was better.  They were both lovely and I was glad I had checked them both out.

I called an Uber and asked to go to C1Espresso, a restaurant in downtown Christchurch that delivers your food through pneumatic tubes.  I ordered fries and then sat and waited for them to be delivered to the tube nearest me.

I loved the menu.  This was the centerfold. I could tell how C1Espresso feels about the leadership of my country.

To find the toilet in this restroom the bookcase slides open and you decide which Star Wars character best describes your gender identity.  I considered C-3PO since I have had a double mastectomy but went with Princess Leia.

It is a lovely day in Christchurch and I decided to walk back to our hotel.  Business office windows are decorated with shout outs to Christchurch’s rugby team for tonight’s game.  I walked past the Hari Krishna band, the street preacher and the Avon river.  Our hotel is directly across the street from the Art Centre and last time we were here we tried to enter the Great Hall and see the stained glass window but it was closed for maintenance.  I decided to see if maybe it was open today.  It was.  It is dedicated to all those who went to school on this site and served in WWI. It was installed in 1938 but removed after the earthquake in 2011.  Once restored it was reinstalled.

We left our hotel hopeful that an Uber driver could get us close enough to our restaurant for tonight and therefore, the stadium.  Our hopes became reality when we are dropped off directly in front of Pasta Pasta.  While we ate our carbs Gayle read to us about the rules of rugby.  We had already done this but we were left confused.  We had a bit more comprehension when we walked over to the stadium, but not much.  We stopped at the merch trailer.  We each got a beanie hat and scarf.  We wanted to support the Christchurch team and blend win with the locals.

This game tonight is a big deal for Christchurch fans.  The place was packed, every seat was filled. The Christchurch stadium was severely damaged by the earthquake of 2011 and had to be demolished.  The game we were attending was the first game for the Christchurch Crusaders in their brand new stadium. You could feel the excitement.  Before the game began a former player for the Crusaders carried out a stone from the damaged stadium and put it on a pedestal in the center of the field, symbolizing the team’s connection to their history and to the resilience and rebuilding of this city.  It was interesting to Gayle and I that there was an announcement directing us on what to do in the event of an earthquake.

The Crusaders were playing the Waratahs from Australia. I thought maybe we would hear two national anthems.  Instead, Maori performers did a traditional song.  The men blew conch shells.  It felt solemn and sacred.  When the two teams were on the field, the Crusaders team did a warrior chant to begin the game.  It was beyond cool. 

The halftime show was a rapper from Christchurch named Scribe.  People around us all sang along.

The two teams pushing against each other in a huddle formation; 

the way they lifted up one player to catch the ball when it was thrown in from the sidelines; 

and the spontaneous kicking of the ball to try to keep a forward motion were fun to watch.

The Crusaders beat the Waratahs 35-20.  I cheered like I had been a fan my whole life. Gayle and I left a few minutes early to make sure we could catch a ride home.  We found the line of taxis and grabbed the first one.  

Back to Christchurch

Our hotel had an abundant buffet breakfast as part of our room rate.  We took advantage of it and then headed for Christchurch with full stomachs.  However, we couldn’t leave town without first stopping at Baldwin Street, the steepest street in the world.  There are warning signs everywhere not to turn down Baldwin street because it has no exit and you can’t turn around.  I took a photo but it surprised me that it could be steeper than some of the streets in San Francisco.

We have a five hour drive today, without any stops.  But we are driving up the east coast of the South Island and we want to enjoy the ocean whenever we can.  Our first stop was Shag Point.  It was cool to look at the Pacific Ocean to the east rather than to the west.

Shag Point often has fur seals.  I spotted only a couple.

We drove up a steep hill to find the Whalers Memorial Lookout.  We could see the ocean from almost every direction.  

The snow-covered Southern Alps were in the distance.

In the town of Oamaru there is a discovery center that is helping track and conserve the blue penguins.  They are the smallest of the penguins.  These penguins spend the day diving for food and return to burrows on the shore at night.  The center has created boxes all over the property for the penguins and they come and go as they choose.  We knew it was going to be a long day but I really, really wanted to see them.  So we made a quick detour, paid our money and convinced the woman in charge that Gayle was not going to be able to tour their whole property.  So she took us into a small, darkened shed.  We were told not to speak.  We could look down little periscopes and see the penguins who had not gone out to dive for food that day.  It was very cool.  

Directly across from the center was a restaurant overlooking the bay.  We were thirsty and so we went inside to get something to wet our whistles.  We discovered that they also served gelato.  So we had gelato for lunch.  It was exactly the right meal to have while on vacation.

Outside the restaurant was a cement sea wall, dotted with seals.

Reluctantly we got back out on the road towards Christchurch.  We still had over 3 hours of our trip to go.  The rest of the trip was graced with green hills, occasional views of the ocean and lots of cows and sheep.  We finally pulled up to our hotel just before 5 p.m.  We are staying at the Classic Villas, directly across from the Art Centre in downtown Christchurch.  We read the description of the hotel as we traveled today.  It was a glowing description, filled with adjectives like luxurious, scrumptious, 5 star and boutique.  Gayle went into to check us in and came out to say we were on the second floor and there was no elevator. The two women who manage the hotel had to help us carry our bags up the stairs.  I was embarrassed by how much shit I have!

We ordered food and ate in the room. We watched the live feed of the blue penguins coming in for the night in Oamaru. A large seal was stretched out directly in front of the camera and the blue penguins were trying to sneak up the hill behind him and the two other seals on the rocks. It was like watching a game of “Red Light, Green Light” only you get eaten if you move at the wrong time.  

Dunedin

We left our lovely lake view home this morning and headed out for more adventure.  But first we stopped at Ma Boulangerie to fortify ourselves with some good croissants.  We had a hard time choosing which ones to get and finally decided we would each get one for now and one for later.  There was no indoor seating and it was quite cold.  So we sat in our rental car eating our croissants, covering our laps in crumbs.

When Gayle checked us out of the hotel the woman at the front desk suggested that the best route to Dunedin was through Middlemarch.  This was not even a route we had considered but we decided to trust a local’s suggestion. It was a lovely drive:  rolling hills, lots of sheep, no tourists.  We traveled most of the way to Dunedin without another motorist pushing us to go faster.  It was beautiful in a different way than Queenstown: lake, snowy mountains, lots of tourists.

Gayle suggested as we drove to Dunedin that we should list the ways that New Zealand feels so civilized.  Here is the beginning of our list: 

Motorists don’t honk

People often say, “No worries”

Art galleries and botanical gardens are free

Tax is built into the price you see

No tipping, we are told people get a livable wage here.

Self-service washers and dryers in hotels come with soap

And every town has a sign pointing you to the public restrooms, which are clean!

We arrived in Dunedin to our hotel, Distinction Dunedin, in time for Gayle to take a nap.  I headed out to explore Dunedin, which means “fort of Edin” in Scottish Gaelic, named for Edinburgh, Scotland.  In Maori the city is named Otepoti, but unlike other cities we have visited the Maori name is not prominently displayed.  Archaeological evidence points to this area being the first place the Maori lived in New Zealand, around 1250-1300 AD.  Europeans arrived in the 1830s and a Scottish settlement was established in 1848 by the Free Church of Scotland.  By the end of the 1850s, 12,000 Scots had emigrated to Dunedin.  The architecture here feels very different than any other place we have visited on this trip.

As I walked around the city, I was struck by the number of impressive churches.  This is St. Paul’s Anglican Cathedral. The original building was built in 1863.  It wasn’t well designed and this building was completed in 1919.  I had read that it had impressive stained glass windows but I was too late to get inside.

This is First Church of Otago (Presbyterian) .  It is regarded as one of the most impressive nineteenth century churches in New Zealand.

I kept thinking back to the simple structures of the sacred gathering places of the Maori people.  This is the Maori marae I saw back in Akaroa. I could feel the difference. 

I walked past the Law Courts and police station.

This car was parked in front of the police station.  I would love to know what the story is behind it.

My real goal was to walk to the Dunedin Railway station.  Locals believe it is the most photographed building in the country.

It was constructed in 1906 and at one time New Zealand’s busiest station, serving up to 100 trains a day.  Currently it operates three tourist train lines.  It is beautiful inside.  Besides the train ticket office it houses an art gallery and a restaurant.

I decided it was time to head back to our hotel.  There was a Celtic cross in the park I passed through (which makes sense in this very Scottish city),

as well  as a statue of Queen Victoria, since so many Scots moved to New Zealand when Victoria was queen.

Gayle and I had dinner at Cobb & Company, which is the restaurant in the Dunedin Railway station, in the area where luggage was stored.  The building was lovely at night.

We shared a plate of fish & chips, delivered by Issey, the robot.

We returned back to our hotel to use the free washing machine and dryer (soap provided) in our room.  This is such a civilized country!

Last Day in Queenstown

My cold is still hanging on.  I can breathe but I am very tired.  I got up early, as is my rhythm, but I went back to bed around 8 a.m.  I told Gayle I was okay with spending our day in the hotel room and enjoying our beautiful view of the lake and the Remarkables.  When I awoke from my nap Gayle was getting ready for us to go down to the waterfront and find some breakfast.  I eagerly got ready and we headed out to Vudu, a restaurant which serves breakfast near the lake.  

It was a beautiful day of sunshine, but very cold. When we left the hotel it was 37 F.  Our Uber driver told us it is unseasonably cold this year. Usually the Remarkables are not capped with snow in April.  Vudu was a delicious choice.  We savored our breakfast before braving the cold in search of something to see.  Neither of us brought a heavy coat on this trip.  From our research we assumed that it would be in the fifties in Queenstown, during the day. 

We poked our heads into Patagonia Chocolates, a recommendation from a friend.  The first trip Gayle and I took together as an adults was to New York City in 2010.  We stayed in Chelsea and found this wonderful little Fair Trade chocolatier.  We sat in her shop with our truffle choices lined up on a wooden board and had a tasting.  I wanted to try that again in our hotel room later today.  We each chose three chocolates that we will savor later.

We enjoyed this man and his dog providing music.  The guitar player sang “The Letter” by the Box Tops and his dog howled along to every note.  Gayle threw some coins into his guitar case and he stopped and gave her a photograph of his dog, a keepsake I am sure she will treasure.

Yesterday when I was down in this same area I saw these strange vessels that looked like little sharks.  They went underwater and then they would come to the surface with a big jump.  I wanted her to see what I saw.  We found a kiosk with brochures advertising a ride in the “shark”.  I asked the woman about the “shark” and she said that the “sharks” had been moved to a different location today but would be back tomorrow.  Oh well.  We will be gone tomorrow.  Gayle will just have to take my word for it about how cool they are.

We headed back to our apartment.  We were enjoying the view from our balcony when Gayle spotted a man wind surfing in the lake.  The wind would be great today but it is in the 30s here!

I spent the afternoon doing the things I haven’t being doing regularly, such as charging my electronics and plucking my chin hairs.  We planned our route to Dunedin for tomorrow.  We set up two of our Patagonia chocolates for a tasting. 

Quite a bit of time was spent figuring out how we are going to get to the rugby stadium on Friday in Christchurch without Gayle having to walk a mile. Once I made a reservation for a restaurant close to the Christchurch stadium it was dinnertime.  We decided that it was too cold outside to venture out to find food.  So we ordered Pad Thai (Gayle’s new go-to dish) through Uber Eats.  It was the first tasteless Pad Thai of my life.  Luckily we had ordered spring rolls to go with our meal.    We watched the sunset turn the Remarkables a lovely pink color.

Then we finished packing and called it a day.

TSS Earnslaw/Walter Peak

Our plan today was for a slow morning and that was what we did. Every once and awhile on our trips together, Gayle hits the wall and needs a rest day so her back can recover.  Today was that day.  After I ate breakfast in the hotel I called an Uber and headed down to the waterfront.  We were booked for a 1 p.m. trip on the TSS Earnslaw, the oldest working, full-sized fire-tubed boiler in New Zealand, in other words a coal-fired steamship.

I headed out early so I could experience the waterfront.  It has the typical tourist shops and brand name stores.  There are also amazing restaurants, street musicians and lovely scenery. A statue of William Gilbert Rees graces the waterfront.  He was an early settler here in the Wakatipu basin and is regarded as the founder of Queenstown.  We are staying in the Rees Hotel.

Because I was there early I got to see the truck loaded with coal arrive and at the appointed time dump the coal onto the boat while three men shoveled it down to the boiler room of the boat.

At the appointed time we queued up for our trip on the steamship.  It is a large ship.  There is a lot to keep you interested as you travel along the lake.  You can watch the men stoke the fire with coal, 

or order drinks at the bar and listen to this lovely man sing songs by John Denver, Elton John, Simon and Garfunkel, Ed Sheeran and more, 

or stand on the front deck and freeze, 

or just people watch.  Most of us were headed for the Walter Peak High Country Farm.

Some people were there to enjoy a delicious BBQ lunch. Some of them came to ride horses.  I was with the group that was going on a farm tour.  Our first stop was to see the kunekune pigs.  The name “kunekune” means “fat and round” in the Maori language.

Then we got to feed the donkeys. They were so much fun.

We fed the cattle next.  I loved the fluffy cows called Highland cattle.

There are two alpacas on the farm….

And lots and lots of sheep.

After our tour to feed the animals we were served afternoon tea.  Then we all headed back outside for the farm show.  Our guide showed us how to sheer a sheep.  She did an amazing job but I found it hard not to feel sorry for the sheep.

Then we saw a sheepdog do its job of herding sheep.

The grounds at Walter Peak are lovely.  As we waited for our return trip on the TSS Earnslaw I wandered through their gardens.  I have never before seen this color of hydrangea.

We were all loaded back onto the boat for the trip back to Queenstown. The view of the Remarkables mountain range from the boat was gorgeous.  New Zealand is so beautiful.  It was very, very cold today, however.

Once we returned to the dock I decided to walk over to the Queenstown Gardens.  I am so impressed that gardens in New Zealand are free.  What a lovely, civilized country.

I was hungry by then.  Our afternoon tea, while lovely, did not fill me up.  I headed to Fergburger.  Before every trip with Gayle I create a Google sheet of possible places to eat in every city we visit.  Fergburger was on my list.  There is a lot of hype about this place that advertises itself as a gourmet burger stop.  It is notorious for long lines that move quickly.  I got in line.

While I waited for my burger, fries and onion rings (why not try it all) I saw the couple Gayle and I rode with on the helicopter ride back from Milford Sound.  Time went by quickly as we talked about rugby.  I didn’t even have to wait 15 minutes for my food.  I had a lovely Uber driver return me back to the hotel.  The food was still warm by the time I got to our room.  The hamburger was okay.  I am a huge fan of an In-n-Out burger and nothing ever seems to equal it for me.  Gayle and I shared onion rings and French fries as we updated each other on our days.