Touchdown in Christchurch

Yay the day has finally come!! I’m off down the south island to meet with kathrin and start exploring. Yesterday was a little sad – it was my last day at work and even though I have been there for such a short time I made some good friends. They bought me a cake and a photo album before sending it around to sign. Great sign off – maybe I can pop back and see them sometime.

So I woke up early this morning and Dave drove me to the airport where I managed to work out how to check in J. The flight down to Christchurch was great as there was so much to see out of the window going over the mountains at the top of the island.

When I landed in Christchurch I found my bags and made my way on a shuttle to the escape rentals office to meet Kathrin. We have an awesome van with two dolphins and lots of colours and I’m sure it will appear in many of my photos along the trip.

We first went to pack n save and stocked up on food that should last us most of the time down here before popping to the warehouse for some other bits and a shopping centre for a last meal. That butter chicken curry is going to have to last me a whole month as I’m not sure we’re going to have the money to spend on meals out. Once we were all sorted with a topped up petrol tank and food to last us a while we decided on somewhere for the night and set out … we had a couple of options but decided on Amberley Beach campground where we scored a powered site for $6.

We didn’t have much time to fit in much sightseeing so focused on sorting our van out and organising our things for the night. It really is a cool little van and looks like it will be very comfy! We also met another traveller who had been going round the south island for three weeks … instead of throwing out his uneaten food before flying up north he passed in on to us to add to the piles of it we have already!! Every little helps though and we will be able to pass it on to someone when we’re near the end as well.

So that was my first day … currently ready for bed just relaxing before we go to sleep. I feel it may be rather chilly at night here although we haven’t quite got so far as to use the amazing blanket kathrin bought with her yet – we’ll save that for in the mountains and down near Queenstown where I believe we may freeze haha.