Day 12 Picton to Christchurch

Day 12 Picton to Christchurch

On the 12th day of Christmas my true love gave to me....., bus tickets to Christchurch! Today was the day that I leave Picton for the city of Christchurch. I have not been there since two years before the earthquake and now was the time that I wanted to visit. One thing that was pulling me there was that I could get a drive of an army tank somewhere outside of the city. It can be seen as one way to bring tourists back there as it is what they need to help rebuild the city.

The morning I got up at just after 6am as I was going to do my own custom walking tour of the town. The first thing I was wanting to look at was the cemetery to see i I could find any of the people who helped make the area what it was. The cemetery did have nice views and was a hilly climb, which is located near a hostel that calls itself Tombstone. This is the American term for a headstone and not many people actually realise this at all. There were modern graves amongst the older graves too. After this half hour wander, I headed towards a square that had me interested. I found it was actually a huge roundabout with a park in the middle, so not really anything of huge importance. I slowly wandered back towards the hostel as I knew I wanted food and then be ready to jump away onto the bus. I did get the shock of my life just after I had crossed a set of train tracks as the bells went and I waited for the train to go past. Soon afterwards I was at Subway trying to explain that I wanted. The chick accidentally toasted my six inch, but I was not worried and she was not the only one either. My drink spilt on the floor and she was happy she wasn’t the only one having a funny morning. By this time I really was running out of time, so I had to checkout of the hostel and was in time as before I left the bus arrived although it was 15 mins early.

The trip to Christchurch showed many different landscapes as we travelled down the coast. We followed the coast line most of the way and the train line did follow most of the way and was at times closer to the ocean than what the bus was. We did see seals on many parts of the beaches and in the water too. At one stage we actually had fog that closed in along the road making it hard to see. There were mountains that had snow on top still and they did look beautiful especially when we were at out comfort stp for lunch. I wandered around the town and it was called Kaikoura. I don’t know much about the town, but it was a beach town and that is if you call a stony beach, a beach. This didn’t stop me from taking pictures before hopping back on the bus. I did get a little turned around when I entered the city of Christchurch and found the hostel alright with no problems at all.

The view from the bus was not that much especially when there seemed to be loads of roadworks being done and several houses had been roped off. Once I put my stuff away, i was then able to go looking around and exploring. I did not go near the restricted zone just yet. I wanted to see if the museum was still standing. Once I walked through the local park and had a quickie though the Botanical gardens. I did visit the info centre and then had a quick look through the museum before it closed for the day. One tour that was interesting and creepy at the same time was the one where you could tour the red zone. It might be a decent trip and help a city that is struggling. After leaving the museum behind, I wandered towards the red zone. There were something that I found had in fact survived the quakes. One of them happened to be the memorial arch for WW1. There were some odd sights on the way around. One was a soccer pitch, Pac man on the fence with the ghosts and a super mario mushroom. There was a shopping centre that was called Start up and looked like they were shipping containers with mobile banks too. I was worried about using one, but I don’t think they would be too much trouble. Several buildings that seemed to survive was actually Calendar Girls aka a strip club and even the local library looked unaffected on the outside. You could see the devastation through looking at the Cathedral area especially when next door there was a backpackers that had been badly damaged, called Base. I don’t know what the front would actually look like. It was not a pretty sight and bought shivers up my spine as I could have been there when that happened.

I did find that the house of Dyslexia was still standing and that was pretty good and the seats spoke once you sat down on them. By this time I was looking for food as I was half way through an aimless wander that was to take me all the way around the Red zone. I ended up on the other side of the city looking for a burger place and found a supermarket instead. I knew they had food so ended up with a bacon and egg pie that I munched on all the way back to the Red zone. Something that did worry me a little was a loud rave party that was going on near the fenced off area. I don’t think this would be really any good for damaged buildings with loud techno trance type music blaring out of a tent. All the people were in white and I don’t know what this was about anyway. On the way back to the hostel across the road from the casino, a man asked me where the hostels were and I pointed him in the direction of where he had come from. Since Christchurch is not an easy city to get around at the moment, it might not be the sort of place where you could have a place not booked and I am now unfamiliar with where to stay if i had no where booked.

Tip

Supermarkets can provide a decent snack if you know what you are looking for. The deli can be an interesting place. Bacon and egg pie and a chicken and mulberry quiche was a good dinner, but should they have been heated? They are the alternative foods to eat.