Auckland to Christchurch
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We gave ourselves a few days to recover from the
long flights back to NZ and then decided to hire a car and go exploring. It may
seem odd to hire a car and stay in hostels when we have a perfectly good boat.
However the distances in this long thin country are deceptive and we were warned
that the sailing in the South is often challenging. The west coast is well into
the latitude of the roaring 40s with winds that have nothing to stop them except
south America and Cape Horn.
Our first stop was Napier, a seaside town that was destroyed by an earthquake in the 1930s much in the way that Christchurch has just been hit. Consequently much of the town was rebuilt in Art Deco style and has a bit more character than some of the unplanned town centres we have visited. We stayed in a very average hostel with my sister Mary and her friend Penny before heading on to a rather better hostel close to Wellington. At both places we managed to find good restaurants to eat out. Generally the standard of food and especially coffee is excellent in NZ. The weather was kind and we had a good walk over the hill behind our hostel.
An early start the next day to catch the ferry across the notorious Cook Strait where the wind funnels between the North and South Islands. Fortunately for us the weather continued to play along and we had a good crossing, the ferry entered the Marlborough Sounds which make a dramatic landfall. We landed at Picton, buying lunch at its excellent bakery then had a good trip down a scenic road to Kaikoura, famed for its whales and fur seals, its views and its mountains that plunge right down to the sea. Sadly for us the weather decided to turn and we had a day of almost continuous rain except for a brief respite in the afternoon which allowed us to walk along the beach and see the fur seals that make their home here. They have the ability to walk on their hind legs and were reminiscent of the sea-lions that we enjoyed so much in the Galapagos. 
There was plenty of birdlife along the shore including these cormorants.
Our next stop was Christchurch. It seems incredible that we were in the Cathedral where many people lost their lives a few weeks later. It was a buzzing place and when we were in the Cathedral square there was a party atmosphere with street performers entertaining the crowd .
The earlier earthquake had left some obviously damaged buildings such as this one but the scale of the damage was tiny in comparison with this week's events.
Christchurch was the most attractive town that we visited and we both said that we would have liked to have lived there. Our hearts go out to the people of what was a wonderful city and hopefully one day will be again.
On a lighter note our hostel for the night was in the old Jail-house. This building was, until about 1997, a high security jail. An excellent renovation has brightened the place up but it still had the air of a jail-house and it was strange how people seemed in awe of the stark building and its history and consequently moved around rather quietly. Our cell on the left and an original cell on the right complete with inmates' artwork.
We have no iea if the building survived intact in this
last earthquake but it was maasively built in concrete and had sustained no
damage in the previous earthquake other than a broken clock that fell off the
wall.
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