International Terminal

Leaving a mostly empty apartment in South Coogee, we checked into our Jetstar flight to Christchurch. We lost our sun tan lotion that came from East Lansing in security – too big and doesn’t qualify as medicine. I also lost my watch on the plane after failing to fully clasp it when changing the time to NZ time zone. I realized it 10 minutes from the airport when Mike asked me what time it was. With luck, they recovered it on the plane and delivered it safely to my empty wrist. A Happy Meal from the Burger King drive through (I know, I know, what a way to start, but we had a long drive ahead of us and no time to dawdle) took the edge off our hunger and provided small plastic Simpson’s toys that light up for the ride.

Flying into Christchurch, you can see the fields divided by something. Up close, they’re HUGE hedges perfectly manicured. To our disappointment, we didn’t catch the gadget that gets the 30 feet (10 meter) high hedges to be even height.

No roos or wombats on highway signs in New Zealand, but the warning that a choo-choo train track is approaching is pretty sweet.

We stopped for dinner at Lake Tekapo in the central South Island. It snowed here the day before, but was easily in the mid to high 50s, so it was definitely packing snow. The lake was a turquoise colour set off by the snow covered mountains.

I hope the sermons here are fascinating, because a picture window about the size of the wall faces the mountains and lake.

It was a long drive (probably 6 hours in the car) on a mostly deserted, but very well marked road to Queenstown in the south central part of the South Island where we’ll start out day tomorrow.