We left Queenstown around midday of 20 June (after a heavy one!) to make it to Christchurch for the All Blacks, England rugby match on the 21st. About a 4-5 hrtrip from QT to Christchurch, and as we had already spent a few days in C'ch we knew our way around. The 21st was mostly spent buying merchandise and thinking up ways to wind up the All Black supporters at the match although we did get to a beach near the city. Before the game we had a few drinks in the hostel (one was free!), put some paint on our faces and boarded the coach to the stadium. The AMI stadium only has three stands at the mo as one in being rebuilt for the rugby world cup in 2011 which is being held in NZ, so the capcity of the stadum was about 15-20 thousand. The pre-match entertainment was a reinaction of the battle of Britain with old school dressed fire fighters and B52 bombers flying over head. The anthems followed then the haka which was cool! Just before kick off loads of red & white balloons were thrown over the All Balck supporters, and they would pop them, but one genius filled up a balloon with beer which got sprayed all over a kiwi when he popped the balloon. Within 30 seconds of the KO the All Blacks were 3-0 up through a penalty kick by Carter - sign of things to come we thought, and we were right - final score 44 - 12. There was a security guard that looked just like Elton John, who toook quite a bit of flak from the english fans. The All Balck fans were pretty quiet during the game & didnt really throw any banter at us apart from 'whats the score' which is boring and unoriginal. The 2,000 english fans were louder then 15,000 kiwis. We went on a night out after the game, i still had paint on my face and pierre wore his england shirt. The hostel bar was small and was literally packed to the rafters, so after a few drinks we went to 'The Holy Grail' which is a four storey pub/nightclub which was rumored to be where the All Black team were going but they never appeared.

We stayed in C'Church for about 3 days after the match whilst we tried to decide how to get to Auckland. We spent ages phoning campervan companies and discussing whether or not to do the north island solo. We even thought about bringing our flight to Fiji forward so we could enjoy the sun for longer, but Quantas had no space so we ended up flying from C'church to Aukland. We managed to book a flight that was to take off less then 24 hrs later so we didn't loose much time. We spent 1.5 days not really doing much. We did have a night out and it was really good, it was really busy. Although we organised the hire of a car to drive down to Rotorua, i was the only one of us allowed to drive as i was the only one to have my physical licence with me. So we drove down to Rotorua which was about a 2 hr drive, at times it rained so heavily i could not see the road and could barely make out the road lines. This was only in patches, and when we safely arrived in Rotorua we checked into a hostel where we met quite a few people we knew from the kiwi bus. Pierre had a friend of his a 'local' called Melissa who he knew from working at Le Grande Mare with him who lived in Rotorua, whom we met up with for a drink the first night we were there before putting us up the following night.

We woke up early the following day and followed Melissa and her boyfriend to their house before having some brekkie. That afternoon we went to 'off-road adventures' where the three of us went in a monster truck around a some off-road terrain in the pouring rain which was really good fun, at one point the truck is on 2 wheels at a near 45 degree angle, how it didn't roll over only a physics teacher could tell you. After that we went luging (again!) after the fun we had in QT we couldn't not do it. Although Rotorua is better for lugeing, longer track. The day we did it, it was lashing it down which meant brakes didn't work, added to the that, our competitive nature, it was inevitable there was going to be 'a big stack' and there was courtesy of Sven (Melissa's boyfriend). He tried to over take me on a straight before a sharp S bend, he ended up tumbling off the track and then tumbling onto the track resulting in cuts, bruises, grazes and a deep sense of lost pride. He managed to get his cuts patched up but not his nice new trousers. Great fun but we thought if we did that course in the same way we did the QT course in the same conditions with 7 of our mates then somebody would have died, almost certainly.

From the top of the hill where we did the lugeing, you could see the Geysers and hot springs letting off steam and the sulphur stench. Cracking view i thought. That night we went to a couple of pubs with some of Melissa's friends although it wasnt a late night we ended up emulsifying ourselves in nostalgia by watching "40 cheesiest songs" at their friends house, 'barbie girl' came in at no.1 if i remember correctly. The next day we left for Auckland again. Gave the car back checked into a hostel inevitably met people we knew from around NZ had a night out to celebrate and say our goodbyes.

Following day we flew to Fiji!