Well the south island adventure is over for now and we are back home on Curious in downtown Auckland.

Our last full day with Ebyjeeby gave us another great drive over Arthurs Pass from Greymouth on the West coast to Christchurch on the east coast.

Some incredible changing scenery, huge gorges and dramatic drops and diverse geological landscapes, a great way to round off 6 incredible weeks.

We had debated staying the last night outside Christchurch but in a minor show of solidarity with those still living there we decided to return to the motorpark that we had left the day before last months earthquake.

We learned that there had been a number of strong aftershocks and sure enough that night we were all woken by another aftershock of around 4.6 magnitude.

It was a bit surreal to be rocked around in the motorhome but no apparently no more damage was done in the city.

Talking to some of the locals it is hard to imagine just how scary these aftershocks are for them and around 45,000 have left their badly damaged homes and are unlikely to return, looking to rebuild their lives elsewhere.

There is a clear divide between eastern and western halves of the city, with no indication at all in the west while the east lies in a state of devastation.

Up to 100,000 homes have been damaged, around 10,000 will need to be torn down and the cost estimates currently stand at NZ$30 Billion (£15 Billion) It will take 10 years to rebuild the city and as long for NZ to recover from the financial impact. Now that more is known about the nature of the fault lines and the make up of the ground beneath the city some tough decisions will have to be made about the viability of some large urban areas. It is likely that parts of the eastern suburbs are no longer viable as living spaces and will need to be returned to green spaces and new housing built in areas to the west. Even so it is likely that many people will decide that Christchurch is no longer safe to start and bring up families and have or will move elsewhere. Fortunately NZ has the space for them to do so.