The next part of the trip was a sad one, as it involved heading back to Christchurch to drop Arwa off at the airport. We'd had so much fun it was going to be horrible saying goodbye! We had planned the trip so we could drive back via Arthur's pass, which is supposed to be really beautiful - because we obviously hadn't done enough driving through beautiful scenery! We started off up the coast still and took a little detour to Greymouth in search of a CD shop to buy the Jason Mraz album - but again the one shop had sold out! We then hit the pass, with me driving to start, as it was my turn, but after lunch I got stupidly tired and had to hand over the driving to Arwa - which wasn't fair as she did loads on the last trip, but her eyes weren't closing so it was the safest option. We also took the car over the 200,000 km threshold which was a good achievement - even though we'd only done 2500ish of those! The pass was beautiful, with winding roads and glacial valleys, but I was probably too tired to appreciate it properly which is a shame. The one thing we had left to tick off on our "must see" list was kiwis - not the fruit, or people, but bird! There are 3 places in Christchurch where you can see them, but unfortunately by the time we arrived - after 6 - we were limited to one, which was a strange kind of place, that looked really run down. They claimed the algae etc was to make the environment as natural as possible, but it all just looked a bit stagnant and falling apart! Nevertheless we wandered round to fill in the time before the guided kiwi tour and looked at strange messy looking geese and wallabies with joeys in their pouches. My particular favourite was the lemur who kept looking at us - or at least the camera! - but I obviously liked the kunekune pigs too - kunekune being the Maori for fat-fat! I guess they were that... When it came to the tour we loitered around in reception watching the people going into the Maori show - this was hilarious as when they passed through the gateway they had their photos taken with a Maori woman and man, who apart from the tattoos and outfits looked pretty normal. As soon as the "say cheese" call was made however, one would stick out a huge tongue and the other would puff out their cheeks and they'd both brandish their weapons and look really scary, seconds later they looked normal again! The tour was pretty interesting, we were taken through the kea avery first, where the guide told us about these fearless birds that will land on your car and eat the rubber round your windscreen til the glass falls out! Before they had cars to entertain them they used to prey on unsuspecting sheep and when they got caught in deep snow they would eat the fat right off their back - yuk! The kiwis where much bigger than I expected - bodies kind of the size of footballs! we learnt more egg facts for our collection - the kiwi lays the biggest egg in relation to its size and it weighs 450g - the same as an albatross egg! Our egg facts were called into question though as this exhibit compared them to a chicken egg of 75g - the penguin man had told us 25g - now we were confused! The kiwis were cool, but obviously live in a reversed world as they are nocturnal so we had to watch them in complete darkness!
We headed back to the jailhouse again, where we bumped into Andy, who did pharmacy with us in our year at Bath - small world! He was actually working at the hostel but we hadn't seen him there on our last visit. It was a pretty sad evening, Arwa packing, me loitering around. In the morning I drove her to the airport where we finally found a Jason Mraz album which she got me as a present for my lonely drive down to Wanaka. After she had gone I set off back to the hostel and checked out and started the drive. I tried to not stop really and just drove and drove singing loudly (and badly) along to Jason, but there were so many beautiful things to take photos of so I kept having to stop. I also made a point of going through Geraldine to take a look at the largest jersey in the world (which I'd read about in Joe Bennett's book "A land of two halves") and the re-made Bayeux tapestry - out of knitting machine needle things (well it is a jersey shop!)- very odd, you have to see it to believe it. The guy who made this strange piece of what I guess you'd call art work is there in the shop to talk you through it and explain how it took him 25 years to complete and show you the one paintbrush he used for all the coloured bits. He even explains how the original tapestry is incomplete so his daughter designed a completion to the picture and he has made that. Alongside this weird obsession, he also designs puzzles - really hard ones! - which he sells, and he also plugs his interactive DVD in which you can click on any single person in his tapestry and it will give you a history of that person - I had to admit that was pretty clever...
The main highlights of the drive to Wanaka were the lakes - I drove past Tekapo, which was so turquoise in the sunlight! and then the lake Pukaki - just north of which is Mount Cook - unfortunately this was covered in cloud as I passed, but the lake was still breathtaking. Just past this lake, I went pass some dams and water works and I saw a sign for a rowing complex. By the time I'd decided to check it out I'd missed the turning, but shortly after I saw another sign for rowing - under one for a salmon farm... I turned in here and sat watching some single scullers coming towards me (very slowly!) I felt really homesick at this point, I wanted to go and talk to them as they loaded up their trailer, but realised I would have appeared a freak, so didn't! After this I was back on the road and this time didn't stop until I arrived back at the mountain view backpackers in Wanaka. I love Wanaka. I have to steal Joe Bennett's description and would quote it if I could, but I've sent the book home! - but its something like "take the lake district, stretch the mountains, widen the lakes, put more snow on the peaks and shoot 14 out of every 15 tourists!" It was nice, I felt like I'd come home as we'd already stayed there a few nights. I met a group of five Irish who had booked to go canyoning the next day, like me so it was nice to chat to them.
The following morning we got up pretty early to be collected by the bus, but we got a phone call saying it had been put back 2 hours due to overnight rain. This was annoying, as we'd all got up and had breakfast, but not as annoying as if it was cancelled,which we'd been warned it might be. So we had a pretty chilled morning, watching "the Wedding Crashers" before finally bundling in the minibus and heading for the Niger gorge. I was put in a separate group from the Irish, which was a bit disappointing as they would have been really funny, but my group was still pretty nice - 3 Canadians. Our instructor was Luke - who was from England, but has basically travelled around for the last 10 years as an instructor for various activities - good life! We were kitted up with thermal tops and shorts and the most neoprene I've ever seen in my life and then had to trek up a ridiculously steep grassy/muddy hill for about 20 minutes - I hadn't considered how we were to get to the top of the river before this point! Luckily we weren't wearing the neoprene except for the socks, but it was a pretty unattractive look hiking up a hill in fleecy shorts and top! At the top, Carolyn realised she'd dropped her helmet somewhere or rather "Big Ron" her boyfriend who had been carrying all her kit and his own, had dropped it. So we had a bit of a wait while one of the super-fit instructors ran back down to get another! We kitted up, had a safety briefing and Luke watched us abseil down a small hill to practise before jumping in the stream and starting our descent. I managed to find myself at the front of the group so in a matter of seconds I was hooked up, climbing out on a copper pipe at least 30m up and abseiling off into a waterfall! No such thing as easing us in gently! I hadn't abseiled for over 10 years so the start was pretty scary, but at the bottom, when the rope runs out, its pretty cool as you just drop off into a rock pool. I then had to wait on a specific rock for the others to come down and luckily my position meant I went last on the next bit. As Carolyn abseiled she managed to lose a shoe - she had chosen some with no laces - so at the next abseil Luke gave her his and did the whole thing bare foot! Next was a jump. Obviously we had the option to abseil,as it was over 8m high, but I was determined to experience it properly, so after Ron had jumped (the other two abseiled) I closed my mind to fear and took a leap of faith into the pool far, far below! Luckily, I didn't die, just had slightly painful ears! After that it was a doddle. We did various jumps - much smaller - and abseils, some right in the middle of waterfalls, so we would turn round and go down facing outwards and hoping we went fast enough through the flow of water not to drown! There were also slides - sit on your bottom and slide down the rock - and head first slides which were pretty scary, but also fun! The whole trip down we had Dave - the boss of the company - filming us for promotional purposes and he'd keep popping up round corners with his video camera. Just as we were starting to get really hungry and cold - it must have been about 3! - Luke produced chocolate biscuits and a flask of ginger and lemon tea - heaven! The final task was an zip line to get us back across the stream. I found this more scary than the rest put together, weird. I had a really awesome day though, loved every minute! That evening I returned to Cinema Paradiso with some of the people from canyoning. This time I was less extravagant, ate at home and only bought a glass of wine - and a cookie - and ice-cream.... We watched Burn after reading, which was pretty odd, but good!
The next day I 'd decided to go on a hike up a mountain. Luke had told me to go to Mount Rob Roy, as its a beautiful rainforesty walk up to a glacier, but I wanted to get to the top of something as so far I hadn't gone to any summits, so I decided to to Mount Roy instead. Luke said it was pretty dull farmland - he was right. What was worse was it was tipping with rain the entire day, so as soon as I got out of the car I was wet. I realised pretty quickly that my careful re-waterproofing of my waterproof had done nothing. I just tramped on, through lots of misty farmland, up and up, in my not-quite-broken-in boots. I saw very few people - they had more sense - but I did have the sense to text Peter to tell him where I was going and what I was doing in case I got lost! I made friends with a few ghostly looking sheep. I finally made it to the top, freezing cold, and surrounded by cloud. No panoramic views of Wanaka for me! I honestly started to think I might die up there, I was that cold, but I had reached the summit so I was happy with that. The wind up there was so bitter and there was no shelter - the little hut was locked! So i took a photo - of cloud - then turned round and essentially ran for my life! I ran until I rounded the bend where the path became sheltered, then I stripped off, put a completely non-waterproof but dry top on and carried on walking. Luckily the rain had mainly stopped by then so I got down fairly dry, but had an inner chill, so stood under a boiling hot shower for a full 15 minutes, then sat in front of the TV with lots of mugs of tea and DVD's all afternoon! Incidentally, no sooner had I got home, the Sun came out and the afternoon was beautifully sunny and hot - typical!
My last day was a reverse of the drive down, and it would have been quicker as I'd already taken all the photos, but Mount Cook was out of cloud so I sat in the car for a pretty long time looking at it and taking photos, before heading off again. Back in Christchurch, Andy was working at hte Jailhouse and I spent the evening watching the first Lord of the rings film and sorting out my car load of junk I'd accumulated! The next day I tried to take the car back, but the place to drop it off was closed, so a kind man at a car dealership down the road leant me his phone to call up and find out where to leave it. At this point I realised I'd forgotten to fill up with petrol, so I had to drive off again, visit the self-service petrol station, have a panic they'd charged me for the previous customer, realise they hadn't, then drive back to the car place. This all done I trapsed into town to find a bus and headed back to wait for the airport shuttle which I caught with a group of americans who were heading to the antarctic centre to be kitted up with cold weather gear for their expedition -exciting! And that was New Zealand - I'd say in a nutshell but I've rambled on a bit!!