New Zealand

I'm recently back from a too-short trip to New Zealand to visit a couple of mates from the old country. Though I didn't stay long enough to take part in any adventure or outdoorsy stuff I was there long enough to see just how much more like back home the place is, especially compared to Sydney. So much so in fact that getting off the plane in Christchurch and seeing a vista of green and treeless hills and fields, lots of green farms and then a road sign pointing for Belfast, caused me to do a double take. Any huge similarity to Ireland starts to fade though once you get to the city and see the streets laid out in a nice grid with individual bungalows stretching off in all directions. Christchurch centre itself is fairly small for a city of its size and seems to be centred around the Cathedral (which didn't get a break the entire time I was there from the cameras of Asian tourists). There was a lot less damage from the big earthquake than I was expecting; isolated buildings like pubs and restaurants had either collapsed or had been subsequently pulled down but by and large the visible damage seemed to be confined to collapsed chimneys, toppled masonry, and outer walls that had to be supported by metal beams. Got to drive up the hills that back on to the city the next day, up very tight roads hugging the sides of steep mountain sides which had absolutely no barrier most of the way. Seeing as I've become more of a scaredy cat in my old age I had to concentrate on not closing my eyes as we drove up. Almost as surprising was seeing how many cyclists were up doing the same thing as us - actually, I saw a huge number of people out cycling and running while there. From that top, with Christchurch spread out below you can see a long like of alpine mountains in the distance, the sort of mountains that filled so many background shots in Lord of the Rings, and the sort of mountains you just can't find here. The next day we took a day trip up into them, to "Arthurs Pass". It was a great drive, across huge stoney river beds, past lots of weird rock formations (including one where they filmed the first Narnia movie) and eventually up high enough to see snow at the edge of the road. Along the way we got to see quite a few Kea birds, the only alpine parrot - quite big, unafraid of people and happy to chomp down on anything, including rubber seals on car doors. Ronan flew down from Wellington while I was in Christchurch and we then drove back up, catching a ferry to the North Island from Picton. On the way we stopped for a night in a small town called Kaikoura, famous for whale watching. I was a little reluctant to go fork out the cash for it again after the experience in Sydney, but this time round was a better experience. The snow capped mountains provided a great back drop, the seas were calm (despite a confusing warning of sea sickness - surely a scam to sell sea-sickness pills!), and we were allowed get much closer to the whales - close enough to actually see them this time! Wellingon despite being around the same size as Christchurch definitely felt more like a big city, probably because of all the government business, its got a great museum with a Maori name - Te Papa - and is squeezed up the hillsides overlooking a nice harbour. We also got to drive out for one day of wine tasting in the Martinborough region northeast of the city, and then crash into a duck on our way back (I was NOT driving). It was great to catch up with my fellow expats in the antipodeas, just too bad I didn't get a chance to see and fjords or volcanos or see the haka or perform any suicidal bungee jumps..