In a strange occurance for someone who is travelling the world on his own, this is the first time I've been on my own for nearly a month! Currently sitting in Christchurch airport, worrying how far behind my journal is and if I'll ever remember it all. Also, I feel a bit bloated from large smoothie I just bought with last of my NZ dollar. Woke up after an awesome nights sleep, which my body wasn't used to, and pootled around vaguely, before bidding farewell to Sarah as she was going to Andora for the day. After some net time, Kirsty and I dumped our now homeless bags and cruised to our place of worship, Starbucks. Had a nice stroll through the park and sat in the intense sun by the river for a while, battling with a cheeky seagull. We returned to the square to bust out some souvenir shopping before wandering into the Chatedral for a gander around. My shuttle was at 1 so we just chilled in the TV room, wtaching an extremely bad film and eating fruit salad. Joff popped over and we said bye the marlen way. Kirsty waved me off as I took the fully packed shuttle ot the airport and I blundered through security and check in via a BLT bagel and a small child attempting to steal my water.Flying. Aided by a plane. That sounds like it's powered by a lawn mower. Aisle seat. Bonus.
This morning we were all quite the tired little puppies, with only about 4 hours sleep. Luckily, rather than having to rek all our stuff 15 minutes out of the city to the crazy hostel that we booked last minute, it turned out Base had room for us all tonight. So after rejoicing somewhat, Kirsty, Sarah and I cruised out and looked for some nourishment, mainly coffe and a croissant in Starbucks. We chilled there for a while, before causing comedy based havoc involving Kirsty and I creating trouble for mother Sarah, culminating in a water related incident. After which we explode a bit more, before grabbing some lunch goodness in the form of tune sandwiches. We met Joff in the square at our prealloted time, though Steph was no where insight and we had to hop on the shuttle to the Antartic Centre. Unfortunately, as we pulled off we saw her wandering into the square and felt really bad. Bus took longer than we anticipated and we must of gone quite far out of the city.Overall I can summerise the Antarctic Centre as "okay". We rushed in to see the cute TINY penguins fed with fish, but there were loads of kids being noisy and pointing, which Joff and I disapproved of. The guides seem to exploit one poor ickle penguin as well, who could only use 1 flipper and so swam in circles. We all then crashed drastically and had to get some surgary liquid based goodness. Rest of the centre was cool, though a bit short, but it did snow on us at one point and we saw some cool arty Antarctic movie. Before tackling Christchurch's transport system, we grabbed some pizza/wedges from the cafe and lay on the grass to summon some energy. After conversing with a moustached lady, we caught the correct local bus but it cost $7!! Big rip off. On return, Sarah and Joff internetted while Kirsty and I chilled in the TV room. Kristy was felling pretty rough so Sarah, Joff and I decide to bust out, not to waste our time here. We managed to get to Starbuck, the other side of the square, and bumped into Jenny and Cat, which was cool. So we sat in the square chatting, and then Hot Katherine and her friend popped up, and we were all like "Hey!". Quite a series of coincidences.Jenny, Cat and Joff departed their seperate ways, so Sarah and I decided to wander towards the setting sun, with a kebab wrap in hand. Luckily we stopped at a more attainable target than the sun: The botanical gardens. Very pretty, with rose gardens, fountains, giant trees, crayz photo taking foreigners, and a river cutting through the middle. We wandered back haphazard style and cooked even more food back at Base and I thought I was gonna explode. The other two actually did, either by illness or tiredness, so I went to join Joff, Steph and Heather just for a few cokes. Which resulted in Joff and I getting insanely giggly on caffeine, making the girls think we were totally insane when playing cards. Steph then grabbed her bus to the airport and we all returned to bed.
Magic bus once more, apparently went through Burkes Pass, and across the Cantebury Plains towards Christchurch. Unfortunately we're staying in Base, but as long as we have each other we should be alright, thought slight anger when it turned out Magic only booked us in for 1 night, and they might be fully booked tomorrow, meaning we have to get up early to either check out or check in again. No matter, we had a bit of an explore (Sarah and Joff), and got to a nice little cafe called the Honey Pot. We had a HUGE sandwich each and a beverage, and randomly Jenny and her friend walked in. So we chatted with them for a while, and invited them out tonight. In the evening about 10 of us, or so, went out for dinner, where I had some awesome Cantebury Lamb, and then we went to find somewhere to drink, though we ended up in Base bar, where I randomly bumped into Amie and Rachelle, which was awesome. People began to depart back to their hostels, but Sarah, Joff, Steph and I went out first to an Irish pub, with a great band playing. We then headed to Sals Square, which had lots of cool bars and clubs, so we had a few drinks, before going into a Jazz bar with live music and a loft full of sofas that we chilled on for a while. Once we left, we wanted to find some awesome food, but were worried everything might be shut, so Joff and I got a back up sausage roll, that we ate anyway, and still found places open, so got wedges (again). Then sleep. Good night overall, though I was shattered at the end.
