UK +1: Happy Christmas

It's good to be back in the UK.

I was determined to stay up till British bedtime today to get the bodyclock back into line and so went shopping with Cesia in the afternoon.

The new toothbrush and shaving gel I bought in Boots were handed to me in this...



...so I guess summer, and this blog, are officially over.

Thanks for reading!

In the air (UK -1): Avoiding Iraq

The flight path from Singapore to Heathrow takes you roughly over Baghdad, but on the way over there we skirted north of Iraqi airspace and on the way back, we skirted south.

Quite what anyone expects the malcontents 11000m below to do to our plane, invisible as it would be to the naked eye, when blowing up cars with bombs made of fertilizer seems to be their limit, I don't know, but I imagine it makes most of the passengers, including me, feel better.

Anyway, I am busy blowing up things of my own...



A family of four was on the three seats directly in front of us. They are Kiwis coming to the UK to stay with relatives. All I can say is (a) God help the relatives and (b) can someone put them in touch with Dr Tanya while they are here. The two boys, possibly about 1 and 3 years old, screamed for about the first six hours of the flight. Every time they screamed they were hugged and comforted and spoken to nicely and fed. Every time one of them was quiet, Mum or Dad would disturb them by getting up or moving seats. Dad called the three year old a "scumbag" a lot. I think affectionately.

And as this leg of the journey was entirely in the dark and we weren't by the window, I couldn't distract myself with the view, so I tried literature...



(...finished the book on the flight...)

...and "food"...



Neither really worked and my plan to get some sleep resulted in several small lolling dozes, none of which lasted longer than the gaps between screaming from the row in front :-(

Singapore (UK -1): Changing at Changi

Well, we just got off the flight from NZ. I managed to watch Millions, as I said I would and James Nesbit was ok.

Flying back this way will be a little easier as we got a longer day through flying westwards and it's only just got dark. (8.30pm, Singapore time). That means the 2320 flight to Heathrow, despite actually taking 13 hours, will seem to take only 6 and a half, if I manage to sleep. There are some old episodes of Friends on the in-flight entertainment system, and that usually does it.

This won't be the last blog post, as I will round it off with a last few photos and observations when I get home. Did I find that 10/10 Hot Chocolate? You will have to wait and see. Well, no, you won't. I didn't.

In the air (UK -1): Sydney etc

As the travelling home takes up some 28 hours (1300 to midnight is 11 hours + midnight to 0600 is 6 hours + 11 hours time difference = 28) I couldn't possibly not say something about it, especially a how once you start rambling to a general audience it seem difficult to stop.

Our first leg from Christchurch to Singapore was OK, all in daylight and with a clear view of stuff all the way. This is Sydney...



(Dad, if you click, you can look at the photo bigger...)

It seems odd that Sydney was only a three hour flight away from Christchurch (and a very cheap one) and we didn't really have time to go. Seeing Australia will be on an entirely different scale to seeing NZ, but seeing Sydney, (if only from up here...) has made me want to do it.

The flight path took us directly over Alice Springs and Uluru, which is a character in Star Trek, but I obviously wasn't looking at that point and didn't see them. What I did see was huge expanses of peopleless, featureless and almost certainly pointless bits of Australia. Bits which exist purely to make it more difficult to get from one useful bit to another. They look a bit like this...



...or, as a complete contrast, this...



...and sometimes have big bits of rock and lakes...



I like to think that on the last photo, we are so far up that the horizon shows the curvature of the Earth, but I suspect it was more to do with some refraction effect of the (reassuringly thick) aeroplane window.

More exciting was this cloud-piercing Indonesian mountain, somewhere near Bali...



...although, quite frankly, it's not even snow-capped, NZ-style.

NZ +27 (UK -2): Other people's holidays

One of the funny things about using internet cafes, is that other people leave photos of their holidays on the system when they leave.

For instance, these people went to Queenstown about the same time as us...



...and these people went up the Sky Tower...



...and these people looked happy to be going sky diving...



...and these people got drunk...



...and these people saw seals better than we did...



...and these people saw a kiwi (possibly) much closer up...



...and as what I am doing is probably illegal, I'll stop...!

NZ +27 (UK -2): The Tram Experience

Remember seeing the tram in Christchurch in earlier posts?

Well, we finally got round to going on it today. The ticket you buy gives you 2 full days of unlimited travel on the tram. Useful on two accounts...

1. This is the only day we could've bought the ticket when we couldn't make full use of it.
2. The tram ride takes about 10 minutes in total and covers a rectangle about 1km by a quarter of a km, so the word "unlimited" is fairly redundant anyway.

But, this is what Sandra ("I will be your driver today...") looks like from the back...

...and this is the view in the other direction...

Shortly after this photo was taken, 6 middle-aged American women got on and started talking about Desperate Housewives so loudly that Sandra earwigged and nearly lost control of the tram. (Can that actually happen?) When we next stopped, Sandra came out to talk to them and had all the Dana/Zak/Mary Alice/Bree's husband/Mama Solice details revealed to her within 2 minutes. They are only on episode 5 in NZ.

Vern, the conductor, who you can see strap-hanging above, was unimpressed.

NZ +27 (UK -2): Giddy up...!

First of all, I should tell you that I am safely returned from horse riding (or trekking, as we are duty-bound to call it, as in "The Waimak River Horse Trek Experience". I tell you this first, as at least two people, one of them my Dad, considered going on a horse to be the most dangerous thing I have done all holiday.

This is despite the 4x4s and the jetboats and the helicopter and the driving 5000km around some really dangerous roads. I think it's just a thing about horses...

Mine was called Rex, and he is a retired racehorse...



And wherever you get horses, you get horsey girls who have been in the Brownies. Our was called Laura...



...and she was from Plymouth. Going on what Joe Bennett said, she should have been a right cow, but she wasn't, she was very patient with people like me who had only seen horses on the Grand National and on French menus.

She went through all the safety features of the horse - how turn left and right, how to stop when she banged her hand on the dashmane etc. But in the end it didn't really matter, because the horses were so used to The Waimak River Horse Trek Experience that they just followed on quite happily one behind the other...



(You were supposed to keep two hands on the reins, but you couldn't take photos doing that, so I was daring...)

We trekked along the Waimakiriri River... (Maori; Wai - water; maki - cold; riri - fast)



...and as this was the river we had already driven over, jet-boated on, crossed by high viaduct on a train, there was only one way left to cross this holiday and so we did...



It was all good fun, although I was unable to move anything below the waist when I got off for about 5 minutes, so they gave us a cup of tea and let us feed their lamb...



(I look a bit evil in this picture, like I'm about to slaughter the lamb and get mint sauce, but I was quite happy really and it lived to see another lot of Horse Trek Experiencers tomorrow...)

They also had goats and calves and chickens and more dogs than you can throw a stick at, but they didn't make for interesting photos, nothing you can't see at the Longdown Dairy Farm Experience.

But this box caught my eye...



...because it demonstrates how far felt-tip technology has been of benefit to the parcel consignment tracking business.

Will I go horse riding, sorry, trekking, again? I might, but no faster and for no longer. Rex, the retired, slighty lazy racehorse and I were perfectly matched.

NZ +26 (UK -3): Liking the book...

I am enjoying the book A Land of Two Halves enormously!

I will share a bit of it with you, which is obviously © Joe Bennett, but is also very funny and concerns his experience of a British-style pub in Queenstown, which we also went in. He manages to be spot on, a little bit sexist and in full agreement with me in the space of three short paragraphs...

It's an Old English pub which, of course, is neither old nor English but it does employ a barmaid so cheerless, discourteous, inattentive, inefficient and unremittingly idle that there is almost no point in asking her where she's from. But I do.

"Barnstaple," she says, and manages to turn its three syllables into "fuck off".

Lots of English people know exactly how to serve. Indeed they do so with both wit and an unrefreshing absence of unctuousness or corporate obidience. Nevertheless, if you encounter a bad shop assistant, or barman, or ticket-seller, a seriously bad one, anywhere in the world, the chances are that he or she, and it's probably she, will be English.

He meets up with a friend, Nico, in the pub later...

Late in the evening, Nico bets me that I can't make Miss Barnstaple laugh. I devote twenty minutes to the task. And lose.

NZ +26 (UK -3): Balancing Kiwis

This will only mean anything to my sister, who bought me a set of these when she was here a few years ago. She will be pleased to know that they are still the number 1 gift of choice...



I haven't bought her any, though...

NZ +26 (UK -3): Trains and Boats and 4x4s (and Lions and Witches and Wardrobes, apparently)

An early start today as we caught the TranzAlpine train from Christchurch Railway station at 8.00am.



This goes as far as Greymouth on the West Coast, but we weren't going that far. We were only going as far as Arthur's Pass, the highest point on the route and then onwards by other means.

The train is great, but it's one of only three long distance passenger services left in the country. There's a great buffet on board and the windows are big and spotlessly clean so that you can see the spectacular views as you climb off the Canterbury plains into the Southern Alps...



Now, on a British train, health and safety-wise, this would have to do you. But here in NZ, where the people are perhaps not so litigious (is that how you spell that?) and are not going to say "Excuse me, but I put my hand towards the window and there was no glass and as a result I lost my arm and the majority of my shoulder on a passing tunnel, I am suing you for $Millions in damages..." you can actually do that.

In other words, there is a carriage with no windows where you can go and stand and look at the lovely scenery...



...you can see the big viaducts we go over, more about them later...



...and you can see, and possibly touch if you were stupid, the inside of the 16 tunnels we go through...



It's another "You'd never get away with that in our country" moment.

Including this next photo as the reflection has produced an interesting curtains effect that I thought I should share...



Anyway, we arrived at Arthur's Pass, and it was coming down stair-rods, so no photos of this delightful National Park village as we raced to our next form of transport, which was this...



Yes, it was another 4x4 adventure for us, but not as precarious as the Skippers Canyon one. This time it began as a journey on the main road up to the summit of the pass to look at the road down the other side, which I'm quite glad we didn't go on...



As you can see, it's clinging to the side of the mountain, cantilevered out over the gorge, with a waterfall diverted over the top and a concrete box to stop the rest of the mountain falling on you if you are feeling brave enough to drive underneath. Is there no end to Kiwi ingenuity?

Anyway, what followed was a gentle tramp through Flock Hill Sheep Station, where we stopped to look at the sheep shearing shed (try saying that when you've had a few...) There were, however, no sheep to be had, but the clues were there...



We also stopped at an old miner's cottage...



...which was a little run down since the miner had left. Or died, more probably.



I wonder if every bed comes with a dead bird, a bit like you get a chocolate on your pillow in posher places. Fortunately, even though the accommodation left a lot to be desired...



...it didn't have to accommodate us, and so we moved on.

We crossed streams...



...saw the viaducts we had already crossed from higher up...



...climbed higher into the mountains...



...and (here's where I'm ahead of you...) saw a scene from a film. But not the one you would expect. These mountains and the glacial valleys in front...



...are the scene of a huge battle and some general goings-on in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, which will be released later this year. I predict by next year, all the NZ Tourist 4x4s and coaches will have pictures of bloody Aslan and bratty children on the side and be advertising themselves as "The Tour, the Witch and the Wardrobe". Or maybe not. Anyway, will have to see the film now, if only to make the "I've been there! I've seen that!" comments to everyone's annoyance half way through.

We finally made it down to the river's edge. It's the Waimakariri River, and from here, it was either back the way we had come, or more conveniently...



(Don't worry, I didn't have to drive it myself.)

We travelled another 17km downstream on the jetboat - no acrobatics à la Shotover Jet this time, but a speedy run down the gorge, seeing the viaducts we had been across and seen from above, but this time from below...



...going over some fairly turbulent water...



...going quite fast...



(although which of those dials tells you that, I don't know...)

...and seeing more nice scenery, but this time from the water...



Then we had a very welcome cup of tea in the driver's lodge...



...which had the latest Ericsson Non-Mobile Phone on the wall...



(...which is made by Ericsson if you zoom in*, and I think looks oddly like a character from the Simpsons...)

...and then we got a lift back to Christchurch on the main road. Of which there are no photos, because driving along main roads isn't that exciting. Even in New Zealand.

I am going horse-riding tomorrow. Never done that before, so wish me luck!

* My dad has just worked out that if you click on the photos, they get bigger.