Day 3 (Mar 8, 2013): Christchurch, Part I

The Quick Facts:

* Drove for the first time on the “wrong” side of the road
* Managed not to kill anybody (including myself) while doing so
* Walked around Christchurch, including the Botanic Gardens and Canterbury Museum
* Accommodations: Haka Lodge Hostel (~15 minutes southeast of central Christchurch)

The Good:

* Small, manageable city
* “Artsy” feel
* People are very nice

The Bad:

* City still very much affected by the earthquakes from 2010/2011
* New Zealand as expensive as Australia (and I know I’m cheap, but this place is legit expensive even on the “NYC scale”)
* The sun is strong!  There is a hole in the ozone layer in this part of the world so there is minimal protection from UV rays, and you definitely feel it!

So we finally made it to Christchurch and thus begins our two-week adventure in the South Island.

Two years on, the story of Christchurch is still dominated by the earthquakes of 2010 and 2011.  Huge swaths of the central downtown area of the city (the so-called “Red Zone”) remain closed to traffic and pedestrians.  Buildings remain untouched from those disastrous days, a virtual time capsule of wreckage that shows how buildings were literally shaved into pieces or simply brought to heaping piles of cement.  On the bright side, the resiliency of the New Zealand people shows through.  There is a temporary retail promenade that has been set up in decorated shipping containers, providing a vibrant walk and selection of retail and food vendors.  And, even more encouraging, the sky is littered with cranes and the streets teeming with construction workers, all focused on putting back the city one building at a time.

After walking around, we stopped by the Canterbury Museum for a bit of New Zealand and Christchurch history.  New Zealand was settled by the Moriori people who came from Polynesia, and later by other Polynesian descendants known as the Maori.  Europe first came to New Zealand in 1642 when a Dutch explorer named Abel Tasman anchored his boat off the shores of the south island…he never made it on shore because the Maori tribe killed enough of his men to deter him.  It wasn’t until English Captain James Cook came to New Zealand in 1769 that Europeans made it ashore, and the country’s vast natural resources kept them coming back.  Christchurch was established in 1850.

We then checked out the Botanic Gardens which were beautiful.

 

And finally, I had to show you this….guaranteed you’ve never seen anything like this before!  This is in the middle of Christchurch on some random corner.  Yes, that’s a washing machine, and yes people actually put money in it to dance in public.  Anybody wanna have a go?

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