The TranzAlpine scenic train travels between Christchurch and Greymouth. From the carriage you get fantastic views of the Canterbury Plains and the Arthur's Pass.
The journey takes 4 and a half hours one way, it is 223.8 kilometres long and there are 16 tunnels, one of them being 8 kms long.
Lyttelton is a small port town next to the Banks Peninsula, and it's pretty much where the colonisation of the area started a hundred and sixty years ago. It's a nice little place to spend a sunny day, and a great spot to take pictures of the surrounding scenery.
Ed showed us around Lyttelton on our second "proper" visit to Christchurch and the Canterbury region. 
The track is on the Eastern Ruahine Forest Park, quite steep, but only 3 hours long.
Gustly winds, rain, hail and massive waves (5m swell) last sunday at Castle Point.
Mail-box, Letter-box...whatever, they are everywhere, even in the most remote places or in the middle of nowhere. On top of a hill, down the hill, after the tunnel, past the river...you might not see any house around, but you'll surely find one of these. Does the postman get here everyday? No idea, but sure they get mail, otherwise they wouldn't have put them there!
ok, we know this is not the Antarctic (although we are not that far away) and that we hardly ever reach the 0º, but most houses here are so poorly insolated, that the temperature inside the home doesn't differ much from that outside. If we had known this before coming here, we would have added an extra pair of socks to our luggage (and we would probably have sneaked another blanket from the plane as well)... We have strong cold southerlies today, which means: it is cold. The MetService website recommends two or three layers of clothing to remain comfortable in these conditions (but, do they mean inside your home? I wonder...)
We spent last weekend at the Muac Hut, below Torua skifield on Mount Ruapehu, around two hours away from Palmy. The hut can accommodate around 30 people in hut style bunks. It's got flush toilets, hot showers, kitchen, coal fire, and lighting...luxury!!
Together with other 25 people we celebrated Bruno's farewell party with a pot-luck (which included an awesome Swiss fondue), slacklining and other ready-made crazy indoor sports...
On Sunday, Phil went up to the summit of Mount Ruapehu (2,797m) together with Erich, and I joined most of the others on a day walk to lake Surprise, a 4 hours walk which is part of the Round the Mountain track.
Our art project on the van is finally finished!! Here you have some pictures of the process, which included projecting the image and drawing, sanding and painting. We are quite happy with the results; however, and contrary to what some of us thought, the flames do not make the van go faster... Anyway, we would like to thank Bruno, Alex and Jackson for their help with the project. As you can guess, our van is easily recognizable on the roads of
What we learnt: Fox Glacier is the longest of the New Zealand West Coast glaciers (13km). It falls 2,600 metres, on its way from the Southern Alps to the West and it's nowadays one of the most accessible in the world. Fox Glacier is said to be moving at approximately 10 times the speed of other valley glaciers around the world.
While Paco and family were on their way to a helihike on the top part of the glacier, Phil and I did a half-day walk with the Fox Glacier Guiding company. Not a single cloud on the sky and the sun was shinning like on a summer's day. The track began through bush on the left side of the glacier, and went on for around one and a half hours until we reached the ice, put the crampons on, and actually walked on the ice. There we walked for about another hour, squeezed through ice holes and arches, and learnt a little bit more about the place. The blue colour of the ice was at some parts really bright and beautiful (unfortunately that was the day when our camera broke down, so the pics we have aren't very good). A bit expensive, but highly recommendable.
On the way to Haast
Bikes for fun in Arrowtown 18/04
Lake Wanaka
Tasman Glacier 17/04
Relajación mental de camino a Wellington 12/04
Castle Point 11/04
Tongariro Crossing 10/04
Wai-O-Tapu thermal valley 9/04
Rotorua
Caromandel peninsula 6-8/04
