The Catlans is a real contrast to Milford Sound, it reminded us a lot of Kent but with more sheep and strange natural wonders. We spent a day touring the Catlans and had a great time going off down dirt tracks and finding our way blocked off by hundreds off sheep and wading through peoples farms of mud to go and see a blowhole a few hundred metres inland. Kate had bought some wellies in the north island at the supermarket much to laura's incredulance but boy did she wich she'd had some when she was holding onto kate and sliding down hills of mud in her trainers. We were hysterical. We also saw some waterfalls and a million year old petrified forest where we collected some shells and played with the massive slimy seaweed everywhere. Right towards the end of the day we saw some yellow-eyed penguins coming into shore which are the rarest penguin species in the world. Unfortunately we still didn't have a camera at that point so we just have a couple of dodgy pics on a disposable but we were very happy to have finally caught a glimpse of some in the penguin capital of the world.

That night we drove to Dunedin which is a city populated mainly by students so we could have had a great night out but actually we were knackered (not to mention quite skint) and so settled for a night in by the fire with our tinned fruit and custard trying to clean and dry Laura's shoes.

The next day we headed for Christchurch via Mount Cook for one last journey through spectacular scenery with Betsie. We spent 5 hours driving up to Mt Cook, took a picture, then turned back around and stopped near the edge of the National park where you actually get a better view than up close and had some soup to warm our cockles. From there we headed to a nice little place called Geraldine and camped the night there where Laura went to bed at about 7 but Kate got to watch Family Guy on TV! Decent TV is a rarity on this side of the world I tell you.

The next day we had a pretty short 2 hr drive to Christchurch, stopping off on the way at a cafe where they give you a free tea/coffee if you're drving. They should have them in the UK. Arriving in Christchurch was a bit baffling as the place seemed huge after all the one horse towns we'd been stopping off in up unitl then. In fact the place is no bigger than Croydon. Also it was freakishly warm! We went around in T-shirts and it was bizzare how much warmer it was than anywhere else in the South Island. Anyways we checked into our nice little hostel by the river and dropped off Betsie. It was a sad time but we were glad to be able to sleep in beds again and have hostel-home comforts. Being honest girls we told the guy who checked the van over that we (Kate) had left the pertol cap at a petrol station and payed for a replacement but that was all we had to pay for.

Christchurch is a lovely little city and better than Auckland and Wellington in our books. Aparently it's the most Englush city of NZ and quite like Cambridge. Kate decided to buy a new camera so that we would have one for the remainder of our trip and so you lucky people can view our pics! We went to some nice cafes, see the pic, where I tested out the self timer on my new camera and also a really cool second hand bk shop where we sold L's copy of Harry Potter and bought 4 fat books with the money for the Cook Islands. Again we didn't really go out due to being a pair of old women and lack of funds or desire to get drunk since the last time...