Christchurch and the Main Divide

A cold corner in the Craigieburn Station from the Trans Alpine Railway.

Our time in Christchurch has gone relatively quick, the weather has been amazing considering it is now winter (Yes! -just past the shortest day). It certainly was a lovely long autumn. Bill has been helping Helen and Ralph, do a few renovations and maintenance jobs around their home as they are starting to think about selling the lovely large 100yr old Villa on the Cashmere Hills and downsize to somewhere on the flat.

H&R lifting the old tiles
Beautiful view of our Bus 

Adding a step & ready to lay
large format tiles

Alongside the maintenance, we have been enjoying walks and social catch ups with friends. Marg B. is renting near by, making it easy to catch up for walks and a movie. The Italian film festival has been on while we have been here so we decided we must attend at least one of these films (or Sheryl decided for everyone!). It was also decided to make the evening an Italian evening by having dinner at the local Italian restaurant Formaggio's. It was delicious, before watching the film, which was a lovely light comedy set in beautiful Italian scenery of course. 

On our list of things to do had always been the TranzAlpine Train (one of NZ’s Great Journeys) from Christchurch to Greymouth over the Arthur's Pass through the Southern Alps. This part of the Alps is also called the Main Divide as it separates Canterbury from the West Coast and Otago in the south and Tasman/Marlborough in the north. The weather can be so different with high rainfall on the western side (very green) and quite dry on the eastern side (quite golden brown).

Hanging the door after 26 yrs

So with the weather conditions looking perfect for two consecutive days, we booked our trip for the next day, for an additional charge of $10 each, each way, we could also take our bikes so thought it well worth it as we would have the afternoon and the following morning available. 

Ready for our adventure 🚉

Arthur's Pass on our return

Lake Brunner in perfect conditions

Along the Wilderness Trail

Ralph kindly dropped us off at the Addington train station and we were on our way shortly after 8 am. The scenery very picturesque with recent snow on the  Alps completing the winter vista. Although the snow wasn’t down low, it was pretty white around Arthur's Pass with heavy frost. The Otira tunnel (8.5km) would have been no easy feat, finally being completed in 1923.`The conditions for the workers must have been terrible – but they only lost 7 men in the 9 year building of it, and at the time was the 7th largest tunnel in the world, and the longest in the British Empire. 
Arriving at Greymouth soon after 1 pm, we disembarked and got on our bikes. We would recommend the train trip to everyone. And hopefully if you do, you have the time to stay the night otherwise it is a bit rushed to get back for the return trip an hour after arrival.The comprehensive commentary is full of the history and geological facts that made the trip so very interesting. 
Greymouth had blue skies but a freezing wind blowing so we quickly found a place for lunch before finding our motel for the night. Once settled in, we got back on our bikes and started on the Wilderness Trail –the cycleway from Greymouth to Ross – a total of 132km which they recommend to complete over 4 days. We had ridden a little of this trail roughly 6 years ago when they first started creating it. The people behind building the trail should be proud of themselves, and although we only did 11km of it, we look forward to returning sometime soon to do the rest through the lush West Coast bush and scenic lakes. With only a couple of hours before dark we decided to ride to Paroa and return. There was a lovely renovated stone Hotel (the original one was built in the late 1800’s – when Gold was bringing in large numbers of people) where we stopped and enjoyed a red wine on the sheltered deck in the sunshine just before sunset. It was then a brisk ride back to our motel for the night.

Beautiful West Coast sunset

Sign of the Kiwi

Sign of the Kiwi looking back to Banks Peninsula with Marg

Bill having some quality time with Murray

A little snow on the Southern Alps

Bathroom before the alterations

Looking amazing - what a transformation.

The next morning again brought blue skies but that freezing wind was still blowing. At 9.30 am it was only 1 degree (a real feel of -2 degrees) so we found a sunny little café to have breakfast before riding in the opposite direction to the day before, over to Cobden and out to Point Elizabeth. With the wind chill factor we didn’t muck around, and keeping in mind we had to be back to catch the train just before 2 pm, we headed back into Greymouth and dropped off our bikes at the railway station. We had a brief browse around the Greymouth shops. Bill even had time to pop into a barber and get a much needed haircut. Although I was present, the woman barber took him around behind a screen where he had the haircut unsupervised once again! Those of you that know Bill with his unsupervised haircuts, know that it always comes out super short, and he always appears so genuinely surprised! I thought his ears would drop off when he got out in the wind after this one!
At 2.05pm on the dot we were back on the track and returning to Christchurch arriving back just after 6.30. A long day for the Rail staff.
We recently celebrated Helen’s birthday with her family over a lunch which was lovely to catch up with all four of their children, partners and grandchildren. In the afternoon Marg joined us as we walked up the Cashmere Hill to the Sign of the Kiwi (a Rest House built in 1917) which has great panoramic views out over Christchurch and back across to Banks Peninsula behind. Being Sunday there were a lot of families out walking which was great to see as the day was pretty cold and cloudy. We were rewarded at the Sign of the Kiwi with a delicious afternoon tea before returning to Helen and Ralph's (10.5km return).
We have been enjoying our stop over with Helen and Ralph, with a red wine or two and their lovely fire. We’re noticing a big difference between winter in the south island compared to the north last year – although much colder it is drier. So far condensation in the Bus has been minimal. We’ve only ran our diesel heater twice in the 3 weeks we have been here. Not sure we will be able to say the same when we move on at the end of this week to Central Otago – Queenstown!