On our recent visit to Christchurch we spent a rainy afternoon at the Canterbury Museum, a highly recommendable place if you are visiting the city, with lots of information about the first Maori and European settlers, and a pretty cool interactive exhibition about the body (sometimes I wish I was 7 again...).
Well, there we came across a replica of one of New Zealand's most famous houses: Fred and Myrtle's Paua Shell House. There were lots of people in the queue to see the house, and we had no idea what the story behind this place was, so we joined them just in time for the next show to begin. So we entered this small cinema where we learnt about Fred and Myrtle's collection of paua shell and other kiwiana stuff.
Fred and Myrtle Flutey spent their whole life together in their small house in Bluff collecting paua shells from the sea, polishing them and hanging them on the living room walls. Along with the paua, they gathered and displayed all sorts of items and icons from New Zealand's pop culture and heritage (what people here call kiwiana-generally seen as kitsch, but loved by everyone). They opened their house to the public and it became one of the most popular tourist attractions in the area until their recent death some years ago.
The collection has now been brought back to life thanks to the Fluteys' family and the museum, and here you can see Phil with his cheeky smile in the living-room replica we saw:
And...yes, polishing all those shells is a lot of work!
Ok, this is one of the funniest things we've seen in New Zealand (and thanks again to the Lonely Planet guide...): The Lost Gypsy Gallery. This guy (who is a surfer, by the way) works in a bus that is filled with gadgets he's made himself out of junk and recycling items. Everything is wind or solar powered and made out of...well, anything he's been finding around!! We spent hours playing with the toys and having a look around the garden where all his best creations are on display.
The views on the way are spectacular, and once at the beach we had a lot of fun trying to climb up the huge rocks there.
And...yes, polishing all those shells is a lot of work!
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. 
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
