Across the Tasman Sea

Sorry about the lack of photos, I just wasn’t feeling all that inspired to take many photos around this time…

Farewell to Australia (for now) and hello to New Zealand; land of Kiwis (and kiwis), friendly smiles and sheep...lots and lots of sheep (48 million in fact). I will be in New Zealand from the 8^th of January to the 1^st of March when I will fly from Auckland back to Sydney for the rest of my time in Australia. My flight New Zealand started from Melbourne Tullamarine airport at a highly civilised 5pm and landed at Christchurch International at an uncivilised 7am. I said my goodbyes to Jenny the night before as she had work in the early morning, and said bye to Paul on the way out the door around 2. I did a thorough sweep of the apartment to make sure I had not left anything, and away I went, catching the tram two blocks before getting the sinking feeling I had forgotten something. Now, some might find this funny (I certainly do), but as I rushed back to the apartment I couldn’t help but feel stupid up for leaving my towel somewhere yet again! I knew it was hopeless going back and indeed Paul had left for groceries, so this makes the second time I have lost a nice travel towel. Sighhhhhh. I hopped back on the tram to the rail station and caught the SkyBus to the airport on the return ticket I had purchased on arrival. The first real snag was upon check in at the airport.

A moment to discuss New Zealand visa regulations: A Canadian traveller need not apply for a visa in New Zealand unless travelling with the intent to work or stay longer than three months. A quick search of visa websites will confirm this, but make no mention of the need for a ticket out of the country. This might be obvious to some, and indeed in retrospect it seems obvious to me, but unless you are travelling under a paid visa (eg. working holiday or long stay visa) you must have proof of a ticket out of the country. I suppose after being spoiled by Europe where the continental nature means you could exit the Shengen area any number of ways, I forgot about the possibility. The lady serving me at the Air New Zealand check in counter told me that the number of people who forget or do not know this stipulation is very high, and it is quite common for her to refer a customer to the ticket sales kiosk before allowing them to check in. Fortunately, to save money I had already booked my ticket out of New Zealand with Air New Zealand and only had to run to an internet kiosk nearby to get the booking number for her to print out a ticket. Now everyone can learn from my mistake and be prepared!

Having gone the cheap route, my flight first took me to Wellington with an overnight stopover before continuing to Christchurch. Cheap or not, flying Air New Zealand was an absolute delight. By far my favourite airline thus far, the cheerful tone is first set by a friendly welcoming and with a preflight safety video featuring naked flight attendants, their uniforms body-painted on. Safety objects and seating are used to obscure any unmentionables, but for the first time I have ever witnessed, everyone on board actually paid full attention to the video; men no doubt checking out the hot flight attendants, women surely keeping an eye on the buff pilot wearing nothing but paint. It’s more than a safety video; it’s an advertising campaign for which the company is very proud, using television commercials to promote their dedication to safety. Whether they’re promoting safety or not, I think there are more than a few guys who will be flying Air New Zealand again! The landing was extremely turbulent, jumping and plummeting like a rollercoaster for 20 minutes before landing. Passengers on board were clearly worried and I saw more than a few faces buried in hands or partner’s arms, but would you be worried if I said I sort of enjoyed it? I paid good money for a flight, might as well get some entertainment in there as well! Think of it as a free rollercoaster ride with your ticket. The plane touched down very softly – especially considering how rough the approach was – and there was a universal sigh of relief, just short of a round of applause for the pilot. Disembarking, I had the chance to speak with the pilot who admitted that Wellington is the only city he has ever landed in which is windier than Chicago (famed as ‘the windy city’). After a thorough but polite visit through customs, I had the lovely prospect of seven hours in the airport – hopefully. See, Wellington is not a large airport and the terminal closes after the last flight. I spoke to an airline representative just before customs about staying in the airport overnight and quietly, almost in a whisper, she told me to “speak to one of the men in orange vests at baggage claim”. Feeling all of a sudden very clandestine, I approached one of these orange clad men and in a similar near whisper said to him, “I was told to speak to a man in an orange vest about staying in the airport overnight.” He studied me carefully, looking me head to toe before replying in a hushed tone, “Which airline are you flying with tomorrow morning?” I told him Air New Zealand, and with one last evaluating glare, he told me simply, “follow me.” So I did, with my bag in a cart he lead me to the elevator and pressed the button for the first floor. “Outside the elevator, turn left then go straight ahead until you come to a lounge area. You can wait there overnight, but you are not to leave that area. Understood?” I nodded eagerly in agreement and rode the elevator up a floor alone. Following his direction I came to the aforementioned lounge area finding a dozen travellers apparently in the same situation as me. Welcome to the Wellington Overnight Club! Well, not quite a club, we are the special few who apparently rode the right airline and have the privilege of occupying a cafe bench for a night of sleep or boredom. Frankly, I did feel special. I hung out with an Aussie mother with her two daughters making small talk as the night became morning, and enjoyed watching the airport come alive around 6am. Did I say enjoying? Whoops, I meant to say enduring. A night of no sleep means a grumpy David, but effortlessly checking into the next flight and sitting through the amusing pre-flight video put me in a humorous mood. The flight was uneventful (as all good flights should be) and I was soon in Christchurch. I took a local bus into the city and a very friendly driver helped me get off at exactly the right stop for my hostel. Ahhh; my first experience with a regular, working Kiwi. Yes; Kiwis refer to themselves as Kiwis, and yes, they are proud of it. This Kiwi always had a smile and greeted every rider with a friendly greeting; from the first minute, I was hooked on New Zealand. The Dorset House hostel was a great pick, the only hostel in Christchurch featuring free WiFi, and situated in a lovely old building. Of course if I thought Australia redefined my concept of “old”, I was in for a shock with New Zealand. While cities like Christchurch feature a good amount of the Victorian architecture popular in the mid to late 1800’s, the rest of the country has little in the way of old architecture.

After a phone call home to check in and assure everyone my plane had not crashed, I set about exploring the city and searching for a towel. The city of Christchurch is flat...no kidding, the tallest building might be five storeys, and it stands out like a sore thumb. One thing the city has in abundance is land, and as such the city has sprawled out rather than building up. Never before have I seen a city of over 300,000 look so dead, but wandering the streets of Christchurch one is left wondering where all the people went. There is the usual mix of backpackers and tourists to whom I would grow accustomed to over the next month, but locals seemed few and far between. Here I also had my first run in with the South Pacific brand of backpacker, and here I would learn to wish they didn’t exist. In Europe most backpackers are the practical ‘take a year off from school and work to sightsee and learn about the world before getting back to real life’ type. New Zealand and Australia attract a different type of backpacker, more the ‘I hate life because I’m so much more individualistic than anyone else so I’m going to run away from everything and just bum around the world because life can’t catch up to me as long as I have my shitty old van and guitar kum-by-ah’ type (try saying that 10 times, fast). I could rant on all day about how much I dislike so many of these people, but I will save you. For a personal rant, feel free to contact me, I love to rant about this particular brand of backpackers. Finding a towel at one of the city’s many outdoor stores, I returned to the hostel and crashed, sleeping through the evening. I woke around 10 and scrounged around in the free food bin, making myself some rice with tuna before returning to bed and passing out again.

I spent the 9^th exploring the lovely city of Christchurch from corner to corner. Oh wait...no I didn’t; I spent the day being a lazy bum. I ventured out into the city, and quickly returned to the hostel to laze around somewhere else. Christchurch is a pretty city with a lovely city centre, but it is mostly a point of entry for New Zealand and lacks much of a tourist scene. The city is best characterised by the English architecture and design which speaks strongly to its founding as a most English of cities in the late 1800’s. And indeed in a time when Australia was a penal colony only suitable for those who are tough enough to brave the rugged outback and those who didn’t have a choice, New Zealand was the civilised ‘England away from England’ many sought. A model of the perfect Victorian town, Christchurch was founded and advertised to settlers as the England of the Southern Hemisphere. To this day Christchurch is a quiet and conservative city which peacefully goes about its business, only asking that visitors follow suit with its upright and proper atmosphere. There are attractions in the city and one can spend a lovely day punting on the River Avon in front of City Hall and through the numerous, well maintained green spaces or enjoy a refined lunch before visiting the Canterbury Museum and the neighbouring Botanical Gardens. Christchurch really is though, a haven of civility in a country swarming with bumming backpackers and voracious party animals. I took in the Canterbury Museum (named for the province of Canterbury in which Christchurch resides) which has a detailed and well presented history of the local area and Maori and European settlement, before grabbing a humongous burger at a burger joint.

The following day was more of the same. I briefly enjoyed the Art Centre Market, exploring the handmade items from local Christchurchers and enjoying the local rendition of the Doner Kebap. I wandered out of the city centre to the Pak’n’Save – New Zealand’s discount supermarket – and stocked up on One Square Meal Bars (more on these in another blog post) and other high energy, low size food before another lazy night at the hostel. I scavenged through the free food bin and enjoyed a lovely curry on rice. Fortunately I was spared cohabitation with the aforementioned annoying backpackers, but instead dealt with 20 or so spiritual wanderers. A conference was held in Christchurch during my visit, an interfaith emporium on the magic of meditation. Nothing against meditation, I believe it is a wonderful way for one to get in touch with themselves and their spirituality, but their conference literally involved over 1500 people (from all over the world) simultaneously meditating, “sending each other strong spiritual vibes and exploring other’s inner soul.” I won’t judge, if this sort of thing helps people to learn and explore their personal spirituality, that’s cool, but it sounds like a pretty convenient excuse to claim time off work for “religious reasons” while visiting a conference with an official timeline of two weeks while actual meetings were scheduled for three days.

Christchurch is a very proper city, certainly not the kind to which one pilgrimages for the outrageous nightlife. It was a very quiet and gentle introduction to New Zealand and while there wasn’t a heck of a lot to do, I enjoyed the comfortable bed and chill atmosphere in which to recover from a crappy flight schedule. I don’t imagine it would be an exciting city to live in, but it is the type of city where one could easily balance amenities and events with a quiet and peaceful atmosphere. I will find myself passing through Christchurch again but there aren’t too many reasons to stay any length of time. It is the type of city one can easily see in a couple days with lots of room to spare. Of course, New Zealand isn’t a country you visit for the cities; you visit for the breathtaking scenery and landscapes.

Note to reader: this would make the blog post with the least photos so far!  What can I say; losing towels, visa regulations, airplane travel and waiting overnight in terminals is boring…