I would be better about posting but my computer keeps dying. And it has been absolutely beautiful outside so I've been at the beach instead of by my computer. I think you understand. So where were we...
4/11/09
We left Lake Tekapo early and headed to Spencerville for what I was most excited for--The Adrenalin Forest! Once again, I wasn't exactly sure what to expect because I didn't do any of the planning but it sounded pretty cool. Basically, it was a ropes/challenge course. There were zip lines (what they called "flying foxes") and ladders (horizontal and vertical), and all different kinds of rope challenges. I stayed in the back for most of it and took a lot of pictures so I don't think there are many of me. Laura only did 2 courses (the rest of us did 4, but we could have done up to 6) so she took pictures the rest of the time. There was only one challenge that I had a really hard time with. There were hanging ropes with stirrups at the end and two parallel ropes to hold on to. The goal was to move your foot from one stirrup to the next by shifting all of your weight to the other foot. All of my muscles were shaking whiles I was doing this. There was a Scottish guy helping us out with the course, like talking us through some of the challenges and he really helped me with that one. I was so relieved when I got to the next platform. At some point through the course I must have banged my leg on something because I got a pretty good size mark on my leg (it is still there now). It didn't bleed or anything, it kind of looks like a burn. But it definitely hurt for a while. There were a bunch of really fun challenges like the Indiana Jones swing and the Spiderman swing. Essentially for both you held onto a rope and swung into a net or a web. Really run. My muscles were really sore after the whole course. It's probably a good thing we stopped after 4 courses. The 5th and 6th were even harder and I don't know if my body could take it. Sad...
So after that we headed to out final stop as a group--Christchurch. It was only another half hour or so from Spencerville, which was good because I think we were all very sick of being in a car. We checked into the hostel and got some dinner ($4 fish and chips, that's were its at) and then figured out plans for the night. They had 2-for-1 drink coups for this bar at the reception desk so we grabbed some of those and decided to check it out. To say the least, it was dead when we got there. It was a pretty big place, 154 Bourbon St, and there were maybe 5 or 6 other people in there besides us. We got our 2-for-1 drinks and moved on. The people at the reception desk at the hostel told us about some other bars to check out in the area so we decided to try to find them. We passed one bar with a lot of people outside so we thought that might be worth checking out. But before we could go in, this guy stopped us and told us that although it looks busy it wasn't any fun because it was all of his business partners. I guess he saved us some time. So he told us of another better place to go, which was the same place the hostel told us about. It was called His Lordship. When we got there it was kind of slow but there was a live band setting up so we decided to stay. And we were very glad we did. The band was more like one lead guy playing guitar and singing and another guy doing percussion and some background vocals. The lead guy was awesome. He had a reggae feel about him. I was really surprised by the music he played. Some Kiwi music along with Ben Harper, Bill Withers (Lean on Me, classic). The amusing thing about that last song... So the same guy we ran into earlier in the night came to His Lordship with some of the people he worked with. They were all pretty hammered at that point but we were talking to them and having a good time. For whatever reason, when the band started playing Lean on Me, we all got into a big circle and started swaying and kicking, like Rockette style. It was pretty hysterical. When he played any Kiwi song, the guys made sure we knew it, they would keep yelling "This is a Kiwi song!" over and over. When the band stopped playing, which must have been before 12 (they didn't play long at all), we decided to leave. we weren't too disappointed though because we were all tired from the days adventures.
5/11/09
Day 2 in Christchurch was much less eventful. We initially had plans to go on another gondola over the city and walk on a few paths where the gondola ended but we figured it could not top the beautiful gondola ride we had in Queenstown. Also in an effort to save money, we decided to figure out new plans for the day that were preferably free. Unfortunately, that started with retuning Deli, sadness. She was a good car. But we lasted without her. We decided to walk around the city a little and try to find the actual Christ Church. We did, and we walked through it. I actually assumed that it would be much larger than it was. But it was very beautiful with some wonderful stained glass windows. We took some pictures and left, probably spent no more than 10 minutes in there. We continued to roam with no real direction. There was a tiny market in the city center right outside the church where there was this chalice structure (hard to explain). There were vendors selling clothes, jewelery (mainly Paua shell), and other random items. Nothing too exiting. We didn't stay long. We went into a Starbucks right next to the market and realized that the red cups are back. Jackie Dolan, you must be excited! On that note, it's really amusing to see all of this Christmas stuff everywhere. It is the same theme as it is at home--red and green, Santa, snowflakes, etc. However, it's hot here during Christmas, so no snowflakes. I think it's odd that they completely adapt to Northern Hemisphere Christmas images. But I guess, what else could they use? Moving on... We roamed though some of the over expensive stores and then decided just to go back to the hostel. Everyone decided to just sit on the courses in the lounge and read, I wrote for a while and then ended up napping on the couch. Kind of seemed like a wasted day but we really couldn't find anything else to do. At night we went back to 154 Bourbon St for some more 2-for-1 drinks (By the way, it was not on Bourbon St). Then we roamed to some other bars that we heard about and they were all so dead. It seemed like no one was out. Or maybe there were a lot of people out but they were too spread out at different bars. We joked about herding them together into one bar so it is busy and fun, I guess that was kind of a NZ sheep joke. So, we went back to the hostel early and I set my alarm really really early for the next day...
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