New Zealand Day Nine: Back to Christchurch

Are you tired of hearing about New Zealand yet?! There's still more! But, sadly, not much more.

I woke up in our cozy cabin in Arthur's Pass, with the fire dying out in the living room. I was surprised to hear Bryan already moving about, and he brought me a cup of coffee and told me that he'd already been out exploring. Our cabin was full of posted information about the kiwi, New Zealand's national bird, a big flightless wonder. Apparently the woods around our cabin were inhabited by kiwi, and Bryan had gotten up early to see if he could spot some. He didn't get lucky, but I think he had fun looking.

We hung around in the cabin for as long as possible, reading a bit more by the fire and sipping coffee. Once it was time to check out, we made the 30-second drive into town and stopped at the Arthur's Pass Store/Cafe to get some breakfast. As soon as we got out of our car, we were greeted by one of the cheeky local kea, who perched right on top of our car! I was worried about him scratching our rental car, so I waved an arm at him, hoping he'd be startled and fly off. No such luck. He just looked at me like I was batty and continued his investigation of our roof.

Struttin' his stuff on top of our car

Erm...excuse me...could you not be on our car?! Anywhere else will do, really

Once the kea had realized that there were no delicious snacks to be had on the roof of our car, he flew off and we went inside to get some breakfast. We chomped down hearty meals of eggs and toast while we watched a few of the birds through the windows. I always think of birds as being graceful, but the kea are a notable exception to the rule. They kind of totter around, and we saw a couple lose their grip on gutters or car windows and have to recover by flapping their wings frantically.

After breakfast and kea-watching, we headed down the road to the edge of town, where there was a trailhead. We parked the car and began down the trail to Devil's Punchbowl Falls. Right away, we crossed a bridge and were rewarded with some stunning views. It was especially nice to see the sun shimmering brightly on the water after all the rain the day before.

What a day!!

It was pleasant in the woods. Everything was vibrant and green after the rains of the day before, and there weren't many people around, so it was very peaceful. We hiked along for a while without seeing any other people or animals. We heard the falls thundering in the distance long before we reached them. When we got there, the falls were very impressive!!

WOW! Big falls!

There was a good view of the falls from the path, but there was a viewing platform up closer. We hung out on the platform while Bryan snapped away with the camera and we both got misted by icy water coming from the "punchbowl."

On the viewing platform

It hadn't taken us long to get to the Devil's Punchbowl Falls, so we decided to continue on to another waterfall we'd been told about by a ranger at the Visitor Center in town. That path was also more or less free of other people, so we had ample room to stop and admire the plants and the few birds we saw, too high up in the trees to be photographed. Bryan did take some photos of the forest itself, since it was dense with some of the strangest mosses and lichens I've seen.

So dense! And it had that great, earthly forest smell!

So much green!!!

Extreme moss CLOSE-UP!

Eventually we got to a viewpoint for the next set of falls, which was called...BRIDAL VEIL FALLS! Yay!!! Perfect timing!

I can see where it gets its name!

After many ridiculous attempts by me  to position my head so it looked like I was actually wearing the falls as a veil, we moved on, heading back down the path toward our car. As we walked, we got a nice viewpoint of Arthur's Pass village. You can see how small it is! It's the kind of town that my dad would refer to as "just a wide place in the road."

Arthur's Pass town...it's there, I swear! Just get a magnifying glass.

We stopped again as we crossed the bridge to appreciate the view one final time before we headed out of Arthur's Pass for good.

Wishing we had another week to stay here!!

Who would want to leave this?!

Somehow we managed to tear ourselves away from Arthur's Pass village, even though it was one of the most inviting places I've ever been. We had a plane to catch the next day and an All Blacks game to catch that afternoon, so we made our way to Christchurch. It was a lovely drive and we had great weather. There were a couple of memorable moments, for instance when a HUGE pheasant unexpectedly flew out in front of our car, causing me to scream like a little girl. It was actually a very beautiful bird, but unfortunately I was too busy flipping out to snap a photo. A few minutes later we were sitting quietly when I said "HEY! THOSE ARE REALLY FLUFFY SHEEP!" and Bryan looked up just as one of my "sheep" lifted its head and proved itself to be a llama. Smooth. Anyway, eventually we pulled into Christchurch and checked back in to the Ashford Motor Lodge, where our trip had first started. We knew that they had bathtubs and we'd be ale to watch the Rugby World Cup on our TV, so it was a pretty easy decision.

After checking in, we walked up the street and picked up some beer to watch the All Blacks play Canada. I made sure we were back in plenty of time for the start of the game so I wouldn't miss my favorite part- the All Blacks haka!!!



The haka is a traditional Māori warrior dance. The dance isn't the same every time, but it usually includes stomping feet, slapping of the arms and/or legs, and tongues sticking out. It's lots of fun to watch, especially when it's being performed by the good-looking All Blacks!! The All Blacks do the haka before every game, while the opposing  team is forced to stand and watch. It's pretty funny to watch as the other team just has to stand there and be intimidated!

The game itself was eventful, but not particularly nail-biting. The All Blacks destroyed Canada with a final score of 79 to 15.

Watching the All Blacks stomp all over Canada made us hungry, so we walked down the street and revisited Spagalimi's, where we'd had dinner at the beginning of our journey (back when we weren't even engaged yet!). On the way, we passed a wedding gown shop, and I stopped and ogled through the windows for a few minutes while Bryan waited very patiently. But not even princess dresses can keep me away from good Italian food, so we moved on. Spag's was pretty empty, and we had a quiet and delicious meal.

Wishin' we had a Spag's in Jurong East!

So that was pretty much our trip. We went back to our room that night and took turns using the bathtub, knowing it would be awhile before we had that luxury again (our apartment, like most Singaporean apartments, doesn't have a tub). The next morning we got up and dropped off our car before catching our Singapore Airlines flight back to Singapore. Again, the flight was most excellent, and it was a nice way to end a trip that we'll remember the rest of our lives- the time we went to New Zealand and got engaged!!

New Zealand Day One: The Adventure Begins

Didn't I tell you we had something big planned? We went to New Zealand! For 10 days! It was awesome! I hope you're excited to hear all about it, because you're about to get 10 straight blog posts, all about New Zealand!

As usual, we headed straight out after work on a Friday. Bryan and I have grown used to flying budget airlines like Jetstar and Air Asia, but this time the cheapest tickets just so happened to be through the illustrious Singapore Airlines. First, a disclaimer: they're not paying me to say this. Now: Singapore Airlines is the most awesome airline of all time. They're SO NICE, they give you a silky pillow and a real, fluffy blanket, not one of those weird paper towel blankets you get on United Airlines. The food is legitimately good, and they feed you about 10 times. The seats are comfortable and more spacious than other airlines; the flight attendants are all beautiful; the movie selection is great; the magazine has a good crossword puzzle; the entertainment systems let you play old-school Nintendo (seriously); and best of all, they give you all the free Singapore Slings you want. And they do it all with a smile. So our flight their was great. We did the crossword, played Super Mario Brothers, watched movies, and sipped Singapore Slings in style.

The direct flight from Singapore to Christchurch was about 10 hours long, and with the 4 hour time difference, we arrived at about 9 AM local time. We picked up a rental car from Omega Rental Cars, and Bryan got behind the wheel for his first try at driving on the left side of the road, in the seat that we usually think of as the passenger seat. We'd been in the car for about 3 minutes when we started hearing horns blaring all around us. Oh no! We both looked around frantically. Had we forgotten to stay left?! Had we already broken some unknown traffic law?! We quickly realized the problem wasn't us. We were on the correct side of a one-way road. Across a big grassy median was another two lanes, going the opposite direction. In that lane, we spotted the culprit: an SUV full of young Asian women, driving the wrong direction!!! Cars on both sides were honking their horns, and we slowed down to allow them to cross the median at a turning area. They drove past it. Oh geez. I was watching them and they were...giving me the thumbs-up?!?! WHY?! This was not a thumbs-up situation! We slowed again to allow them over at the next turning spot, and this time they came over, laughing and giving thumbs-up and A-OK signs all the while. Crazy.

Stay LEFT (crazy wrong-way drivers not pictured)

After all that driving excitement, we were eager to pull into a hotel and get settled. We went for the Ashford Motor Lodge, largely because it was one of the first places we encountered. It was a little early, so we went to get some coffee while they prepared our room. We walked across the street to quirky Sophies Cafe, where we got coffee with unfamiliar names - a Flat White for me, and a Long Black for Bryan. Both were tasty, especially after a long night on an airplane.

We're wearing warm clothes! Yay!!

Funky Sophies

After coffee, we checked into our spacious room. Despite all the caffeine we'd just consumed, we ended up crashing for a few hours. When we got up, we were energized and ready to explore. We started out by walking down a few of the streets around the hotel. Christchurch was devastated by a 6.3 magnitude earthquake in February of this year. The quake killed over 180 people, and was responsible for billions of dollars of damage, much of which was concentrated in downtown Christchurch. The people of the city have obviously done a lot to rebuild, but seven months after the disaster, the city center remains off-limits behind barricades, as efforts continue to demolish unstable buildings and restore those that can still be fixed. Aftershocks (one occurring as recently as September 2) complicate rebuilding efforts. One local told us that 400 buildings have been demolished on the South Island since the quake, and as many still need to come down.

Knox Church, at the intersection near our hotel. Seriously damaged in the earthquake, but still standing.

Throughout the city, spray paint marked dangerous spots and indicated where buildings had been checked and cleared, to make sure there were no people still inside.

Broken window on an unstable building

Among the more official spray paint were some artistic interpretations.

Unusual street art

After winding our way through the damaged streets a while, we made it to our destination - the Christchurch Botanic Gardens. We came in sort of along the back way, off of a somewhat random path. Even so, it was lovely, with a calm stream full of ducks, big willow trees, and dainty cherry blossoms.

Botanic Garden stream

Grandmother Willow?! Man, I love these trees.

Pretty PINK cherry blossoms!

Bryan with the cheery cherry trees

There were regular mallard ducks in New Zealand, but also an unusual duck with an all-white head that I'd never seen before. Apparently it's called a paradise shelduck and it's endemic to New Zealand. I think they're very elegant!

Female paradise duck. Only the females have white heads.

Male paradise duck. Not quite as unique as their female counterparts.

New Zealand has a very uncommon ecology. They have hardly any native land mammals, but over time some mammals (such as rabbits and possums) have been introduced from places like Australia and the UK. Some introduced mammals have thrived in the absence of any serious predators, so now New Zealand does maintain some mammal populations. However, bird life is really where New Zealand thrives. In the absence of land mammals, birds evolved to fill all sorts of niches, and there are birds there that aren't seen anywhere else in the world. As with the mammals, there are also a lot of birds there that were introduced from elsewhere. The botanical garden was our first introduction to local birds, and it was fun seeing a lot of them for the first time.

The non-native chaffinch

Song thrush

Common blackbird

Silvereye (aka wax-eye) in a cherry tree

It was early spring in New Zealand, so a lot of the flowers were just beginning to bloom, and the trees were starting to fill out. We stopped by the rose garden, but it appeared to still be mostly hibernating. Even in its somewhat barren state, it was still lovely and peaceful.

The only ones in the rose garden

Dainty spring blossoms

So pretty

A perfect daffodil

After the rose garden, we headed over to the so-called New Zealand garden, which was full of local flora. Ironically, one of the first things we saw in the NZ garden was a mother mallard duck with her ducklings. Mallards are considered an invasive species in New Zealand.

Mama mallard and ducklings

IT'S SO FLUFFY!!!

There were some interesting flowers in the NZ garden, but I couldn't identify them.

Growing right out of a rock crevice

It was so nice to stroll around the gardens in mild, even chilly, weather. We're so used to stepping outside and being immediately drenched in sweat. It was like a dream to walk around comfortably in a hooded sweatshirt. People don't know how lucky they are to have 50 degree weather!! Eventually we left the garden and headed back through the city toward our hotel. On our way out we saw a neat photo exhibition along the street.

Extensive, nature-heavy photo exhibition on the street

It was strange walking through the city. Parts of it, like the area around the photo exhibition, are totally pristine, and then a block later the earthquake damage is evident.

Freshly reinforced historical building

Christ's College. The peak of the building is crumbled in front of the door.

Serious damage at the college, but on its way to repair.

Damage got more and more severe the closer you got to the city center, which is still completely inaccessible, and blocked by fences. Walking near there was eerie, kind of like stepping into an apocalypse movie.

Eerily still and quiet

The clock tower was still prominent and beautiful, even though it looked a little unstable.

Christchurch Clock Tower

All the walking through the city and gardens had worked up our appetites, so we weaved our way over to Spagalimi's (Spag's for short), a restaurant we'd passed a few times. As we got closer, we were lured in by the smell of garlic, and I was super glad we ended up stopping there for dinner. Our pizza was amazing, and we got to try a couple of local beers that they had on tap. We also got a taste of some quality service, which is always a nice change after Singapore's truly abysmal restaurant service. The restaurant started really clearing out around 7 and the waitress told us we'd better hurry if we were going to catch the All Blacks game!

When we were planning our trip to New Zealand, some friends of ours told us that our trip would overlap with the Rugby World Cup. Bryan and I aren't too interested in rugby and since our trip would be over before the semi-finals and finals started up, and most of the games would be on the North Island (which we were skipping), we figured it wouldn't really matter much. Anyway, after the waitress mentioned it, we figured we would grab some local beers from the store, then go back to our hotel room to watch the New Zealand rugby team (the All Blacks), just to see what the hype was all about.

It was awesome. Rugby is SO FUN to watch! Especially the All Blacks! They're amazing! We had a great time watching them and as soon as the game was over, we were wondering when we'd get to see them play again!

Go All Blacks!!!

Holi Celebration at East Coast Park

While Kathy and Shira were visiting, our friends Swati and Gaurav invited us all out to East Coast Park to celebrate an Indian holiday called Holi. Holi is a Hindu festival celebrated throughout India (and other places with substantial Indian populations, like Singapore). The holiday marks the end of winter and the beginning of spring, and is thus a joyous occasion, full of celebration and fun, and of course, eating. The most exciting aspect of the holiday is that involves throwing colored powders at each other. But I'll get to that.

Shira is a dedicated ultrarunner, and the Holi celebration at East Coast Park happened to coincide with a triathalon (the Aviva Ironman 70.3) in which one of her running buddies was competing. So Shira woke up bright and early and beat us all out there to cheer him on, and we made plans to meet up with her later. Bryan, Kathy, and I took our time getting out there, but still beat Swati and Gaurav (who said they forgot to tell us that when they said to meet at 11 AM, that was actually Indian Time, which means 11:30 or later, haha). None of us had ever been to ECP before, so we spent some time roaming around Castle Beach, wading in the water, and watching the happy little kids building sandcastles.

Overlooking the Singapore Strait

Makes me want to play in the sand!

After we were done digging our toes into the sand, we tracked Shira down and cheered on the runners for awhile. I'd never watched a competitive racing event before, and I had mixed feelings about it. I thought the event itself was really exciting, but I felt bad for the runners, who were running on a track that was clogged with families meandering along, baby carriages, kids learning to rollerblade, and people lugging fishing poles. The laid-back weekenders and the dedicated athletes trying to share a track seemed like a horrible idea. Although there were volunteers on hand to clear the path for the runners, they didn't appear to be doing a very good job. I can't imagine training so hard to compete in an event like this, flying all the way here to do it, then having to dodge sticky-handed toddlers. Ugh. Anyway, Shira's friend was doing well, so that was exciting.

Triathalon ad

Eventually Swati and Gaurav found us, and we joined their friends on a beach adjacent to the race route. There were about fifteen of us total, and we made some brief introductions before getting down to the serious business of clobbering each other with colored powder. Actually, I missed the beginning of the festivities because I'd run down the beach to find a bathroom. When I got back, I was conspicuously cleaner than everyone else, so I was immediately doused with powder, and Bryan and Gaurav picked me up and hauled me down to the water and threw me in! The water makes the powder liquefy and smear even more effectively, and before long we all looked like we'd been caught in the middle of a paint fight.

Adults acting like kids : )

Being tossed into the ocean!

It was so fun! We all chased each other up and down the beach and into the water, flinging powder on each other, sneaking up on people who were starting to look a little too clean and wiping colors all over them. I think I have a new favorite holiday!

Bryan and his mom

Shira and me

After we'd all thoroughly doused in each other in every color of powder there, we took a group photo.

Happy Holi!

All through our raucous party, the triathalon was still going on about twenty yards away. Although we never went onto the track or anything, the two events seemed to be such a bizarre juxtaposition! Serious dedication vs. carefree fun. Weird. Anyway, our little groups was only one of several groups at East Coast Park celebrating Holi, and after we'd emptied our bags of powder we went over and watched another group who was playing music and dancing. I got a kick out of a little Indian girl who was running around throwing sand on people. She seemed to be just thrilled by it, apparently thinking that sand was pretty much the same as colored powder. It was cute.

How did the drummer stay so clean?

As is always the case when we hang out with Swati and Gaurav, Swati had prepared some delicious food, a rice dish I'd never had called....pua? pusa? puah? I don't exactly remember, BUT it was really good! After we'd had a snack and done our best to rinse off in the ocean, we parted with our friends, after many thanks for introducing us to such a fun-filled holiday. Shira, Kathy, Bryan, and I headed for the park's showers and did our best to rinse the color off. As we'd departed, we'd remarked upon how the colors seemed to be staining us pretty well, and Gaurav laughed and said, "Oh yeah, we forgot to tell you to rub oil on yourselves beforehand so the colors would come off more easily. Oops!" But he promised that we'd be back to our normal white selves after a few showers. Well, it was certainly going to take more than one, because our first shower at the park only got the worst of it off. But we'd all had such a good time that none of us minded being stained for awhile. Besides, if anyone asked, we had a good story!