We checked out of our hostel and thought we should pay the Catherdral a visit before we left. We were really lucky in the fact that the local primary school was doing a Christmas carol proformance so we stayed for a bit. It was really nice and festive to hear the children sing 'A Little Donkey' !! Flying onto Fiji later this afternoon...can't wait for bikini weather again.

Now back in Christchurch and haven't got a lot planned today. The weather is slightly overcast and a bit rainy. Just going to wonder the streets!!

Today started with the alarm going off at 5.30am as we had to be ready to go whale watching at 6.15am!! During the morning we spotted 3 sperm whales and a\some dusky dolphins. It was really great spotting whales and we were able to get very close to them. Some were about 18m long! Drove back to Christchurch to return Hilda the car in ONE piece! Booked into a hostel and have treated ourselves to a private room for our last 2 nights here. We are looking...

Drove all the way to kaikoura with very achey legs from the glacier walk yesterday. The weather was fab when we arrived and we found a lovely hostel which was actually a bungalow with only 3 bedrooms. It was a nice change to have a bit of space for a change and it was a lot quieter than the usual places. The only draw-back was the fact that we had to share a bed as it was the only room left. But we had no problem in sharing a double, would have been a b...

We couldn't avoid the rain and today we did a half day trip to the Franz Josef glacier. We started off early and got kitted out in our 'waterproof' gear from the tour operator! During the morning we found out that nothing is waterproof and we were gradually getting wetter and wetter and colder and colder! It was a long 2km walk to the base of the glacier and then we had to put spike things on our boots for the ice. Going up at the start was really ...