After spending a mere 15 hours in freezing Dunedin, where I hiked up the world’s steepest street and inhaled the smell of chocolate from the Cadbury plant, I started heading north to the fork in the road where I could either head for Mount Cook or Christchurch (the South Island’s largest city). Once again I found myself driving in the pouring rain. I decided to skip the mountain for fear that after a long drive it would be shrouded in clouds. Instead I ended up in Christchurch, hoping to spend a full day snooping around.
I had a very hard time finding any accommodation in Christchurch. As it turns out, New Zealand and Australian school students have been enjoying a 2 week break — so everything was booked solid. Except for the YMCA, where I ended up. The Y was actually quite nice. Probably nicer than any other place I’ve stayed on this trip — but it was missing the social feel you get from hostels. It was also a tad more expensive. The hostels were all booked out by entire families on vacation as hostelling in New Zealand is a pretty mainstream activity.
Christchurch was nothing to get too excited about. It looks better from a distance than from within. Or, at least, there wasn’t much to it. I have to give my vote to Wellington as far as New Zealand cities are concerned. Wellington seems to be like hilly San Francisco, Auckland like overcrowded New York, and Christchurch like Los Angeles (flat, at the base of snow capped mountains — but without any freeways).
I decided to geek-out in Christchurch and visit the over-expensive Antarctica Museum. I guess because I couldn’t fit Antarctica into my itinerary any other way on this trip. It was a pretty good show, but mainly aimed at kids with lots of wiz-bang interactive stuff (including a windy chill room you could go into to see what the South Pole felt like). The museum was actually located out at the Christchurch airport. Why? Because that’s actually where several countries funnel their supplies to the bases in Antarctica. Right across the street from New Zealand’s Antarctica offices were the United States Antarctica offices. Behind chain link fences along the road you could see long strips of supplies on palets under netting, waiting to be slid onto Hercules Transport Planes for delivery to the South Pole. I thought it was pretty cool. They do 2 flights down there a week.
Although they wouldn’t accept be as a guest, the YHA people in Christchurch were very nice and helped me secure reservations at a string of hostels that will lead me back to Auckland in time for my flight to Fiji on Wednesday. I’ve been retracing a few places, but I will get the chance to visit Napier on the east coast on the North Island after sailing into Wellington on the ferry tomorrow morning. I’m presently chilling out, cleaning up, and packing up tight for the journey back here in the Havelock schoolhouse hostel where I started on the South Island ten days ago.
