An excellent flight with Air New Zealand, who still give out sweets, when the plane starts to descend, just before landing. And Air New Zealand has the most amazing safety videos. Yesterday it was Bear Grylis, who lead the video, and the previous one featured all the characters from the film 'The Hobbit'. Very creative, and certainly holds people's interest. The videos can be seen on You Tube.
The sky was very clear as we approached New Zealand, so we had a fantastic view of Mount Cook, and all the other mountains, plus the Canterbury Plains. Always an emotional sight, for any New Zealander returning home.
We booked into the Sudima Hotel and collected our rental car. A Nissan Bluebird Silky, very luxurious compared to our little box in Australia, the Mazda 121.
After a lovely dinner and evening with Muriel and Bill, we slept well, and were off early the next morning to explore the Banks Peninsula, an unknown area for both of us. Unlike the plains of Canterbury, the peninsula has very high hills, as can be seen from the photograph below, and glorious inlets and bays.
Coffee at a hilltop cafe, a perfect place to sit and enjoy the view, and drink our morning coffee.
And finally we arrived in Akaroa, a haven for cruise ships, which must boost the local economy somewhat. A cruise ship can be seen in the photograph below, sitting out in the bay. Queen Mary II had visited Akaroa, the previous day, as part of a world cruise.
And of course there were plenty of passengers from the ship, out spending their money and enjoying lunch in the many restaurants which line the foreshore.
Even the local craft fair was doing well.
I loved the picturesque wooden churches.
The French landed at Akaroa, and came to an agreement with the local Maori people, to settle in this area. Their intention, of course, was to take over a much larger area, but England had already signed the Treaty of Waitangi, and New Zealand was taken over by England. So the French were pipped at the post, so as to speak. However, Akaroa has retained a French flavour, and the street names and many shops have French names.
We drove back along the ridge, where we had fantastic views of the bays below us, but no photographs unfortunately, as we needed to keep all eyes on the road. It was very narrow, and twisty and there were sheer drops down on one side. We did not feel like driving over the edge.
When we arrived back in Christchurch we decided to drive to Lyttleton, to have a look and see if the port town was recovering from the earthquake of 2011. However, the damage was still extensive, with many road closures, and houses that were still unoccupied, but still clinging to the cliff face. The view over the inlet to the port was still pretty spectacular though.
We then drove back through the tunnel, with the intention of driving to the beach, namely New Brighton, which is now a very deserted place, especially the shopping area. The shops were either closed because they have been damaged by the earthquake, or closed because they no longer have people shopping there, due to the people being moved out of the surrounding suburbs, which have now been declared 'red areas'. We did not even park the car, in order to walk along the beach, or out along the pier.
Finally we drove through one of the nearly new housing areas, which was deserted, with overgrown gardens, and damaged houses and fences everywhere. It was all very depressing.
We drove back to the hotel, on very bumpy and damaged roads, to an area which escaped virtually untouched by the earthquake and the tremors that have followed afterwards. A very weird feeling. But we were relieved to be back at the hotel.
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