Christchurch, South Island, New Zealand

Heading into the last couple of legs of our trek – the South Island of New Zealand.  We are in Christchurch, arriving around 2 pm on Sunday, Feb 24.  We rented our car and found our AirBnB in the grand Old Government Building (OGB).  The building truly is grandiose.  This time, our rental unit is a two-story, two bedrooms up, one bathroom up, and one bathroom down, along with a living room, kitchen, and dining room.  We’ll be happy here for three days.  Well located too, just across the street from Cathedral Junction where the tram stops.

we never saw this car move, but it's cute and a great advertisement

an old, wonderfully redone building

After getting settled a bit, we wandered around the City Centre.  We found a convenience store at Cathedral Junction, bought some food for breakfast, then had a quick bite to eat (and drink) at a bar before our Tram Restaurant dinner.  Now for the tram dinner -- What a delight.  We boarded a dinner tram, along with about 25 other people and were served a first class, four-course meal, complete with wine, as we rolled gently round and round the City Center on the Tram.  Beautiful buildings, remnants of the Chinese Lantern Festival, and the main hot spots of the downtown area were all within our view, as well as some of the destruction from the 2011 earthquake.

Cool dessert

Speaking of that earthquake – it occurred 8 years ago: February 22, 2011, and 185 people were killed.  Thousands of buildings collapsed or were uninhabitable, and by late 2013, 1500 buildings had been demolished.  We saw evidence of the earthquake, but also a construction boom, indicating a revival and resurgence of the city.

The cathedral then 

The cathedral now

Beautiful old buildings being held up by steel buttresses.

Lots of signs of reconstructions and renewal

On our second day in the city, I washed a load of clothes (last time for a full load, I think/hope). Then we headed out to wander in the drizzly morning.  We saw more remnants of the earthquake and eventually found ourselves in the Art Museum and spent about an hour in it.  We all seemed to agree that the photography exhibition including works taken in the nineteenth century was tops, as was the colonial portrait exhibition.  Another specific work that was relevant was a large Picassoesque painting of Maori women doing a female version of the Haka war dance.

Then we headed over to the Canterbury Museum, our main attraction for the day.  We spent some time here, including lunch.  We all thought the History of the Maori aspect of the museum was excellent, especially since it included the story of the extinction of the moa which the Maori hunted until it was no more.  A contributing factor in its demise was probably the fact that they also took the eggs (quite large), ate them, and then used them for containers. We also saw here, the New Zealand version of paying homage to previous inhabitants of the area (I really like this idea).

Julie liked the exhibition on “Kura Pounamu: Our Treasured Stone,” a mostly green stone somewhat like jade but with multiple uses and tremendous significance in Maori culture: as toki (adze), as symbolic amulets, as jewelry.  Deborah liked the section on costumes.  Gil liked the geology section. Harold liked the Antarctica part of the museum including artifacts from Amundsen’s and Shackleton’s trips, but generally speaking, everyone liked all of the museum.  We even watched a movie about a couple who “wall papered” the interior of their house with abalone shells (called “paua” here).  The couple became famous. . . .  Go figure.

One wall of the Flutey paua shell house

After the museum, we wandered through the botanical Gardens, and then we wandered some more around the Central Business District before we went back to the apartment to rest before our dinner trek.

These scooters are available to rent.  You can pick one up wherever it is, 

go where you want to go, and then just leave it.

Great tram system in the central business district

Deb, trying out the phone booth.  Not sure if they were real or not.

Fountain at Botanical Gardens

Giant Redwood 

We left early to go to Regent Street and check it out, and to go to a locally famous restaurant called “27 Steps” referring to the number of steps going up to the restaurant, but there were really only 25, plus a landing which required from 3 to 5 steps.  Go figure.  A couple of us had the lamb, expecting it to be excellent.  It was, indeed, tender, but lacking in taste, sort of like much of the food here.  It all needs salt and pepper.  But we had a nice dinner, and then headed back to the apartment after some window shopping (and store shopping) on Regent Street.

27 Steps restaurant