Kia Ora

New Zealand (or Aotearoa as it is known by its maori name) sits on the boundary of two tectonic plates but we weren't thinking of that when we added it to near the top of our list all those months ago. We were thinking more about the glorious mountain ranges, sublime lakes, vast national parks that cover a third of the country, world class trekking and the very friendly New Zealanders.

However, the recent history of Christchurch, our first destination on the South Island of NZ, bought home the reality... marred by two major earthquakes which hit a few months apart, in Sept 2010 and Feb 2011, this old city was pulverised taking many lives with it.

There are still cordoned off areas in the city centre after the earthquakes and it's very much a ghost town, someone telling us that over 30k people have since left the city. We took a walk up to the 'red zone' to see first hand and up close the destruction... Tragic loss of 185 lives and historical structures reduced to rubble including the iconic ChristChurch Cathedral. There is a lot of re-construction going on though, every corner you turn, so Christchurch is definitely getting back on its feet.
'When the city falls', a sobering documentary on the earthquakes, is worth a watch for those that would like to learn more.

If asked to summarise Christchurch in a few key words most may say... Tragic, Devastated and Deserted Christchurch.
But having witnessed its resolve as a city we would also say... Resilient, Hopeful and Brave Christchurch.

On a personal note there is also another word we would use to describe Christchurch... Cold! Bit of a blip in our chasing the sun adventure, we were greeted with grey clouds, rain showers and 10 degrees when we arrived!!! We felt like we'd taken the wrong flight and landed back home in London. This shift in weather took some getting used to, coming from near 40 degrees didn't make it any easier. So our new friends were hot water bottles and all the warm clothes we'd brought which weren't many as we were meant to be 'chasing the sun'.

To cheer ourselves up we checked into 'The Jail Accommodation', a converted Jail that has retained a lot of its old life authenticity including black & white stripped bedlinen and cutlery.

We spent a lot of time in the local library using their free wifi to plan our onward adventures, it also had the added benefit of providing us with shelter from the rain.

We didn't do much of the touristy stuff apart from Hadley park and the Botanical Gardens but we're sure that once NZ's second largest city is fully reborn it will be a force to be reckoned with.