We’re in Christchurch now having spent yesterday travelling down from Wellington.

I don’t really associate New Zealand or Australia with having different words for stuff although I’m not sure why as clearly in America they’ve got a whole raft of different vocabulary from Jello to sidewalk. Anyway, it caught me by surprise to find out that honeycomb is called golden hokey pokey here and perhaps that explains why we found it so funny we drew stares from the locals.

The day after our adventures in the hills above Wellington we spent at a slower pace. A leisurely lunch with M and C led into an afternoon exploring the Te Papa museum and learning more about the history of the country from the pacific islanders who originally settled the islands to the gold rush of the 1800s.

Our journey down to Christchurch was every bit as scenic as I’d hoped. We began with a ferry journey across from Wellington that allowed us to see some of the coast from the sea. Truly spectacular cliffs lined the route as we navigated down what looked like some tricky channels into the small town of Picton.

It was a very small train that would then take us the rest of the way down to Christchurch on the east coast of South Island. This turned out to be a bonus as due to the low number of people travelling we wound up with four seats to ourselves and the opportunity to sprawl.

We began in vineyard country before heading into the hills and down to the coast. I still can’t quite believe how blue the pacific is around New Zealand but I had plenty of opportunity to gaze on it as the train hugged the coastline for a hundred kilometres. As we passed through Kaikoura we managed to catch glimpse of some seals enjoying the afternoon sun and behind us the southern alps’ snowy peaks kept us in shade for a while as the train meandered on.

We pulled away from the coast as dusk began to fall, travelling through more rural landscape. The grass here was a shade of green I usually associate with CGI and a series of tightly formed, geometrically diverse hills left me with a vague sense of a beautiful if alien landscape. We rolled into Christchurch in the dark, looked over by a low-slung crescent moon and feeling like we’d seen something special.

And it was good.

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