Day three - Christchurch to Lake Tekapo

What a day! I am currently sat at 800m at lake Tekapo after a day all over the place. 

After a rather delayed start to the day today, due to me needing to catch up on some well deserved sleep we finally left our hostel. A hostel I would not recommend to others. I don't know how much the hostel was damaged in the Christchurch earthquake and how much was due to lack of care, but I felt as if I was in a an old peoples home with horrible long corridors. It was cold, didn't feel particularly clean and had no charm and character defiantly not one I will be recommending. Any how, rant over.

After leaving the hostel we headed into the central part of  Christchurch. This is also the area which was most badly affected by the earth quake. Even though I had nothing to compare it to (as I did not see Christchurch before last years horrible earthquake) it was still devastating to look at. Considering it was 11am on a Wednesday morning you had no hustle and bustle like any other city, the main area is all cordoned off as they pull buildings down one by one. It is very spooky to see a city left in such devastation almost like a ghost town.  

The city still managed to look lovely, just very sad. They are slowly trying to rebuild and regenerate with shops made from containers appearing where the high street once was. After doing my bit and spending $10 in a shop on twiglets. I just couldn't resist Sorry Dad.

After looking around the centre of Christchurch very briefly we made a slight de-tour via a computer repair shop. Over a month ago I spilt milk on my laptop and for the last month I have been using the on screen keyboard as all the letters where messed when I typed. (This has been the main reason why my blog post have been so short lately) So with my fingers crossed and no longer caring how much it would cost I hoped the repair company would be able to fix it. After a few phone calls the man managed to find my parts and said he would have it fixed by the end of the day.wooo  

Our plan for the rest of the day had been to head out to Akora and go on a hike. Finding out if my laptop could be fixed had taken away part of our day for this but we figured the weather was lovely and we did not have very long for the whole trip we might as well stick to our original plan. So of we headed. The drive was not overly interesting to start with. With us staying on the straight and flat, with not much happening around us. After about 45 minutes however the landscape changed. We began to twist and climb and slowly the most stunning rolling hills began to appear. 

After a further 45 minutes Akaroa appeared and it was defiantly worth the drive. A stunning little coastal town hidden away and protected from the elements by the valley it is in. We enjoyed spending a couple of hours here taking photos, enjoying a cup of tea and looking in a couple of shops. We where both disappointed we had to leave but both said we would come back as there is ample to do here especially if you like sailing, hiking or fancy going dolphin spotting.

A little bit of quiet time at Akaroa. © Vanessa Law

 

 

 © Vanessa Law

After leaving Akaroa we made our way back to Christchurch to pick up my laptop (which you will all be pleased to hear is now fixed :) )

But our day was not over yet we now need to begin to make our way to Lake Tekapo. When staying at the hostel last night in Christchurch I saw a poster advertising Lake Tekapo and even though it had not been on our plan to head that far in land I figured why not. So we changed our hostel from Omaru and at 6pm began our three hour journey to Lake Tekapo. The drive was not too bad and we had a beautiful clear night the only downside to doing the drive at this time meant we where missing out on what was happening around us we were driving blind.  I had no idea if I had mountains around me or lakes and farms. Surprisingly I found the night driving not too bad and only slightly freaked myself out when talking about a horror movie I had seen where some backpackers are driving in the middle of nowhere and get kidnapped, eeeeek.  We make it to Lake Tekapo in one piece with only a slight mishap when trying to find our hostel with very few sign posts or lights and no idea what so ever what side of the road the lake was on. After many wrong turns and going to the wrong backpackers we finally arrived at the YHA Lake Tekapo backpackers. So here I am unsure of what is waiting for me outside the windows in the morning, but fingers crossed it won't disappoint and will look exactly like the poster. 

Thanks for reading everyone. 

See you all tomorrow with a picture of what I wake up to. 

Katie. x.x