Day 8 - Christchurch

Dedicated readers will be surprised to learn that today’s berth at Lyttelton Harbour was not at a wood chip wharf. Instead we found ourselves alongside the container terminal.


Unlike Dunedin where nothing seemed to be happening, the movement of containers from semi-trailer to wharf and from wharf to semi-trailer was continuous. The huge container lifting vehicles (they’ve probably got a name – I’ll find out sometime and insert it later) were also relocating containers within the existing “stacks”. Who would have thought (as we were planning for this trip) that I would get the added bonus of observing - with considerable interest - the operations of a container terminal! It quickly became obvious to me that the container stacks were organised along the full length of the wharf on a ship by ship basis.



This last photograph was taken from the building on the hill behind the container terminal and featured in the following picture. Its purpose was both a time ball and a signal station (pre 1941). The historical society continues the tradition of dropping the time ball at 1300 and show visitors through the historic building that resembles the observatory ??? in Greenwich. The timeball we were told provided a valuable service for mariners (before modern technology) of indicating the precise local time once a day.


Bus queues were much less of a trauma today. Maybe the fact we ordered room service for breakfast and got off the ship an hour earlier may have had something to do with shorter queues. So into Christchurch we go to explore.

Gorgeous weather again! Today there was no cold wind or threatening clouds. Tonight however as we put together the blog, and are approaching the notorious Cook Straight, we are starting to roll a little so out come the ginger pills for the first time. Not bad for day 8.

Christchurch Cathedral stands boldly in the city square. Lots of history captured within the walls of the building. What was notable was that they now have single chairs with padding instead of hard uncomfortable pews.


Tram rides and punting was the order of the day. The tram was a very welcome rest for the weary feet and to see some more sights of Christchurch.


Punting on the Avon River was also lots of fun. We had the only woman punter in the world! (according to the tram driver -well probably Christchurch.. The result of that was a longer trip up stream. The ducks were up close with many different varieties.







We stopped in at the Canterbury Museum and there was some great relics from past
Antarctic expeditions and history of Maori beginnings, honouring the first settlers of NZ. We may not get to see any live Maori shows which is a bit disappointing as I remember that as a highlight from last time.


Then back to Lytlleton and time for those famous NZ ice-cream. They had Hokey pokey and boysenberry flavours, bringing back memories from my first NZ touring. As we caught the mini bus from town the local driver was telling us that we were the 25th ship to arrive this season. They expect 60 ships through the whole season. Some will double the towns population. We worked out that’s about 3 ships a week.


This photo of the ship was taken from the Time Ball tower. As you can see it was a steep climb but well worth the view. On our walk Roger noticed this letterbox which gives some indication with the amount of moss on it of how cold and bleak the winter months may be.



Great to get back to the ship and put our weary feet up and chill!


More tomorrow.