Our long awaited and eagerly anticipated trip to New Zealand began with us coming very close to missing the plane. We had the day to end all days in Hong Kong, rushing around like mad things trying to get everything done. We eventually left our home in Happy Valley less than two hours before our flight was due to depart and Friday traffic in Hong Kong is legendary! We finally turned up at the airport just in time to walk straight through and reach the gate just as it was about to close. Cutting it fine! Anyway, we had a great flight with Air New Zealand, good food and, of course, fantastic wines. We slept well, too, but it seemed we had scarcely dropped off before they were waking us for breakfast before we landed in Auckland at 6.30am Hong Kong time but already 11.30am in New Zealand.

Luckily for us our flight made it in first among several due to land at a similar time so the airport was almost empty and we sailed through, the first to reach immigration and first to reach the bio contamination inspectors. Luckily we are now old hands at this and knew to wash all our shoes before we packed them and not to sneak an apple off the plane so we got through without a hitch and made it over to the domestic terminal in good time for our flight to Christchurch.

Our arrival in Christchurch was a little bumpy but nonetheless fine. Within 15 minutes we had collected our bags and picked up the hire car so all was going to plan. What wasn't in the plan though was the weather. It was 30 degrees C, very sunny and boiling hot! Not typical South Island spring weather at all and we so were not dressed for it. Not to worry, by the time we reached Dunedin about 5 hours later it was 11 degrees and raining so all back to normal.

In between the sun and the rain we had the long drive from Christchurch to Dunedin. It's a long, straight drive along the Canterbury Plain with almost no opportunity to lose your way. The railway track follows the road and every so often you catch a glimpse of sparkling blue to your left to remind you that the sea is only a few hundred yards away. Along the way we passed many fields of sheep and once, surprisingly, a field full of hundreds of small calves. We saw many small towns and villages with British names such as Ealing, Chertsey, Ashburton, Mayfield, Arundel, St Andrews etc, etc and in the end we lost count.

We stopped for coffee and a sandwich in Timaru, a larger town with a port and, so it appeared, a military exercise going on if the number of soldiers with guns was anything to go by. Nevertheless, Timaru was really quite quiet, bearing in mind it was a Saturday afternoon.

We drove on through Oamaru, where we stayed on our last trip and where we has seen the little blue penguins. Likewise we drove on past the amazing Moeraki Boulders and the turn off to Fleur's cafe where we enjoyed a great lunch last time. The road had become a little more interesting now, more hilly and winding, and the scenery starting to look very like Scotland with beautiful yellow broom everywhere.

The temperature was dropping and the rain started to fall. As we reached Dunedin and made our way along the Otago Peninsula the light was fading fast. We drew up at Camp Estate at about 8.30pm and were met by our hosts Nina and Roger who quickly ushered us in out of the cold and settled us in front of a roaring fire. A far cry from the heat of Christchurch!