Christchurch, round 2

So right after I got back to Christchurch, intern friend Jordan flew in to Chch as well.

I had to work the next day, so we hung out and watched the Olympics, of course, until Saturday. While I was at work, Jordan was looking in to things he wanted to do in the area and we had talked about renting a car to make travelling easier. Both of us are 20, so it wasn't easy for us to even find a place that would rent to us.

So, Saturday morning, we take the bus out to where all the rental places are and we thought we knew where we were going, but really we didn't. So we walked. And walked. In the rain. A jogger came by and we stopped her and asked for directions. She wasn't really sure where the place we found online was, but gave us her best guess. She kept running and we kept walking. A little bit later, she comes back and said she realized that it definitely wasn't wear she thought it was and so she called her young son and had him look it up online and she was so incredibly helpful. So we finally make it to the place that will rent to us, only to find out that they don't have any automatics and neither Jordan or I can drive manuals. So we keep walking. We stopped in another rental place not too far away and asked them and they wouldn't rent to us but were kind enough to call a place that would and reserve a car for us there. So we walked there and Finally, got the car.

We drove downtown and took a tour of the botanic garden, which was extensive and fairly historic for NZ. Then we took a bus tour of the red zone. Much of the CBD is still cordoned off while repairs and tear downs go on from the devastating earthquakes that started almost two years ago. The red zone had gone much smaller since I'd been there and the development was very promising. The tour took us by the famous cathedral, which is currently a point of controversy, but was a lovely building, even as it was falling to bits. We also looked around in part of the museum nearby.

Then we put our hard-earned car to use and drove to Akaroa, a French settlement on the peninsula. It was a cute little town, but much of it was shut down for the day, which was approaching its end by then. The sun set around 5:00 or quarter after, so we still had time left to watch more Olympics!

Sunday we drove around Chch going lots of places and taking lots of pictures (which I'll post sometime, I'm sure). We went to the New Brighton Pier, Lyttleton, and Lydia Street!

Jordan returned to Auckland, I finished my final paper, and the next and final week began.