Across to South Island and Christchurch

Manda writes:

Every once in a while we spend hours upon hours travelling to get from A to B. Today was one of those 'travelling' days - in the true sense. It was time to leave North Island and go explore the South.

We left the backpackers in Wellington at 8.30am and made our way south. The first leg of the journey involved a ferry ride across Cooks Straight to Picton. I had taken some travel sickness tablets prior to the journey as I'd read that the trip across the Straight can sometimes be rough. Even before I boarded the ferry I was feeling a bit light-headed. I swear those tablets make you feel ill before you actually board the mode of transport in question, to take your mind off being sick and focus on the dull headache that you have acquired instead! The journey itself was calm and, on hindsight, I needn't have taken them. Ho hum! The ferry trip lasted three hours in total, in which time, I managed to spot some dolphins swimming next to the ferry. Passengers have spotted whales in the past, but unfortunately not on this trip.

The first signs of South Island, capped with light cloud.

Having tried to arrange car hire but to no avail, we took the train from Picton down to Christchurch. We bought backpacker tickets to cut costs, fully expecting the seating arrangements to be 'optimised'. But to our surprise, we found that there was a lot of leg room - just as well as the journey took five and a half hours. What did we do to kill time? We played card games, read magazines, listened to music, drank tea, read the advertisements in the magazines and played more card games. At the same time, taking in the beautiful scenery outside which changed from green hills to red tinted lakes (as a result of algae not blood bath!) to rocky coastal regions. We even spotted seals sitting on some of the rocks as we travelled alongside the coast for the best part of 100 kilometres.

Having been 'on the road' for eleven hours, we eventually checked in to a backpackers in Christchurch at around 7.30pm. It had been a very long day. After a few drinks and several Chess games later (probably not one of my wisest decisions!), I understandably, crashed out shortly afterwards.

The name of the backpackers is Foley Towers, and we were greeted by an English man at the reception. He was no John Cleese, so let's hope that this place is not anything like Fawlty Towers. However, the similarity in names (accidental or deliberate?) is not lost on the owners - inside the rooms are the rules of accommodation, and alongside these is a picture of Basil Fawlty (one rule reads: "Be nice to each other - you never know when you might need some credits in heaven. Meanwhile avoiding BASIL's wrath is a good enough reason").