Christchurch to Lake Tekapo

I woke up at about 7 in the morning and updated my blog for yesterday. I let the kids sleep until after 9 AM. The weather in Christchurch was cloudy and drizzling. Not very inspiring for us to go out and explore the place. There was a free laundry room in the motel and we decided to quickly do our one day of laundry. We went to the office and bought a packet of detergent for $2 and were told check out was 10 AM. It was 9:50 at that point! We threw our laundry in the washer and went up to pack.

The lady took our breakfast order and kindly told us we would absolutely need to be out of the room by 11 AM as a courtesy. We quickly went back to the room to pack up and finish showers. Enjoyed a breakfast with yogurt, toast with butter and marmite and some fruit. We dumped the clothes in the laundry and headed out to do a little exploring. We found our way to a nearby mall (with my still nervous driving). We found a mall nearby and had a great time browsing. It was refreshing to see prices that seemed much more reasonable (and comparable to US prices) compared to Sydney. We bought some bread at a fresh bakery and a lot of lollies and crisps for our drive at a supermarket. After an hour or two found our way back to the motel to grab our laundry that we'd thrown in the dryer before we left.

After grabbing our clothes, we decided to find the city centre and "Cathedral Square." The place is still reeling from the massive 2011 earthquake and most streets were blocked. We didn't even get a sight of the cathedral (apparently cathedral square is till all blocked off), but found another massive warehouse store in a mall and bought all sorts of goodies. Actually it was more window shopping than buying. Let's just say there was enough stuff we were tempted by.

It was around 3 PM when we got in the car for our drive to Lake Tekapo. By this time, I was quite comfortable driving and I didn't feel on edge any more. i know when I get back home, I'm going to have some sudden panic attacks as my brain tries to process whether I am on the right side of the road or not.

As we neared Lake Tekapo, we encountered some spectacular scenery of the Southern Alps. There were some really breathtaking views and the temperature also kept dropping. We started in Christchurch at about 7 degrees C and it steadily dropped and by the time we hit Lake Tekapo, the outside temp on the car read -0.5 C. Still comfortable by Duluth standards.

The "Godley Hotel" is more of an older motor lodge. The room, though clean, is dated. Completely padding-less frayed carpet, paint peeling on walls and warnings about how we only have a limited allotment of hot water highlighted the room. Still, I'll admit it is possible the Park Hyatt experience is still unfairly coloring all our perceptions. There's one thing the Godley Hotel does have - fantastic views of the lake.

We spent a half hour in the hot tub before heading to the "Jade Palace" for a Chinese dinner.