So we have now arrived in Christchurch after a wonderful and relaxing two weeks on the road around the South Island. Our main reason for coming to Christchurch is to enrol on a sailing course in the nearby Lyttelton Harbour. This harbour is where many British expeditions to the South Pole started from. One of the islands in the bay is where Scott of the Antarctic trained before his ill-fated expedition to the south pole. Christchurch still has a strong conection to the South Pole as it is home to the American administration centre which is responsible for their Antarctic bases at McMurdo and the South Pole. In summer, they will fly huge Galaxy supply planes, equipped with skis to the Antarctic to resupply the bases. So naturally, being keen Antarctic explorers, our first port of call was the Antarctic Centre which houses exhibits and info on life in the Antarctic. Christchurch is a very English city. For example, you can punt down the river Avon which runs through the city or take a stroll alonng Oxford Terrace, Canmbridge Terrace, Gloucester Place and many other streets named after english towns. It's feel is also very English, with roses, geraniums and neat lawns filling the city. At it's heart is Cathedral Square and the surrounding streets are filled with pavement cafes and restaurants, basking in the glorious sunshine. Christchurch is home to one third of the Souith Islands one million residents. To put it in perspective, the South Island is about half the size of Britain with around only a million habitants, making it very sparsely populated as we have found on our travels. Most of our time here though has been spend sailing in Lyttelton which is 15 minutes from town. We embarked on a 5 day course to learn the basics of sailing. On our first day we met our instructor, Jeff who owns the sailiing school. He's a Brummie who came here 43 years ago and decided not to leave. We were in good hands as amongst his many years of sailing, he has sailed from New Zealand to England, taking a leisurely two years at sea and many ports of call along the way. Our first task was just to understand the sailing lingo - takking, gybeing, foresail, stays, winches etc. With that under control, we headed out to sea for instruction on how to hoist the sails, read the wind and practise some turns. Homework that night was to practise our new knots! Throughout the week we were able to assume more and more control of the boat until both our skills we so finely honed we were able to sail single handed. With some more difficult manouvres such as the man-over-board manouvre and figure of eight turns mastered, we felt like real salty sea dogs! The final day we were able to put it all into practise. Jeff took it easy and told us where he wanted us to take him. After working out our course, we were given complete control of the boat, meaning we had to prepare the boat from scratch, including getting the sheets set, preparing the sails and taking her out of her berth under engine. Once at sea, we hoisting the sails, set our course and worked our way up the bay. The satisfaction for us both was immense as only five days ago we didn't know a sail from a bow knot and here we were today, sailing a 35ft yacht by ourselves. We have definately got the sailing bug and plan to take our skills further when we get home. We definately think there might be a round the world sailing trip in us!!