In the morning we said farewell to Australia and boarded our Air New Zealand flight to Christchurch, New Zealand. The countries of Australia and New Zealand are so closely linked in people's minds, that it is common to think they are quite close together. In fact, they're about as far apart as Canada and Mexico, and it's a three-plus hour flight to get there. The first thing we noticed, as we crossed the coast, was beautiful snowcapped mountain peaks. (Snow is rarely, if ever, seen in Australia.)
Christchurch is the South Island's largest city and is at about the same latitude south that Nashua (NH) is north. The weather was quite pleasant and cool. Our hotel was the Centra, which looked as if it had seen better days, but was otherwise pleasant. We took a quick walk to nearby Cathedral Square, but it was getting dark so we found some take-out food and brought it back to our hotel. Here's a view from the room.
We had the day to ourselves, so we started by walking back to Cathedral Square. There is indeed a magnificent cathedral on the square, but the lighting was never good for a photo. However, the square features what could be the world's largest ice-cream cone...
I just had to get a cup of coffee here...
... but it wasn't so simple... Many places down under, if you ask for "coffee", you'll get espresso or cappuccino. Then, you'll be asked if you want a "long black", "flat white", or some other phrase that needs a secret decoder ring. If you want what Americans call "coffee", you sometimes have to ask for "filter coffee." Here, though, that wasn't a choice (the reception my request got was like walking into a bar and asking for milk...), so I got a mocha instead, which was quite good. I could get to like this stuff...
© 2002 Steve Lionel - - Home