It is a short 1.5 hour journey down to Christchurch in the South Island, James our CEO and guide is travelling with us, we collect our and his luggage while he goes and gets our new bus, it is blowing a gale and bucketing down which is a bit of a shock to the system.

Christchurch had a devastating earthquake in 2011 and it has taken all this time to re-build the city, most of the city is new, however, there are some of NZ’s oldest buildings still remaining alongside some very modern architecture. Christchurch is very flat and easy to explore on foot.

Christchurch Botanical Gardens

…is located in the central city and were founded in 1863, the gardens sprawl over an area of 21 hectares ie 52. Acres and lie adjacent to the loop of the Avon River. We pass by/through it on route to our accommodation and it looks stunning and well worth a visit, I might get to do this when I return to CC at the end of my trip, we are staying in the Bealy Quarter which is very central, tonight we may get to meet our 5 new joiners after dinner if not it will be in the morning, we have 3 Australian’s, and a Welsh/Spanish couple joining us.

Tomorrow we will travel north to Kiakoura, it has been a very long day so it’s laundry and an early night for me.