This country continues to amaze me with it's scenery - and I know the best is still to come (Milford Sounds).Although the weather has been a little iffy is this area, we were treated to one day of sunshine and (eventually) the summit of Mt Cook appeared from behind the clouds, in all it's snow-topped glory! Great stuff!

Just here for a night, on our way to Mt Cook....and still some b****** managed to nick some of our food!Anyway, a short but strenous walk up Mt John to the observatory soon made me forget about that (because of the views and not the fact that I was completely knackered....I definitely can't wait to get home and do some exercise)!!There is also a cute little church (of the Good Shepherd) right by the lake, complete with a statue of a collie dog - a tribute to the ...

It's not hard to see why this place is often described as the most English of NZ's cities - walking around the botanic gardens, along the Avon River with the trees in their wonderful autumnal colours - you certainly feel like you are back in Blighty!Highlights included the International Antarctic Centre where we were able to get a first-hand taste of -18°C wind chill (it's rather cold since you ask); going up the gondola which had great views of Christchurch...

We came here after a recommendation from our mum!It's a nice enough 'alpine' town popular with people from Christchurch. We managed to do a couple of walks and then rested our weary bones at the Hamner Springs Thermal Reserve. Lovely jubbly!

Got the ferry from Wellington to Picton - thought we were in for a rough ride but sadly it turned out to be perfectly calm in the end. Boring! I was hoping to smile smugly while people suffered from sea sickness! ;o)Were treated with some lovely scenery while driving to Kiakoura - some of the mountains even had snow on them! Booked my 'swim with dolphins' thing as soon as I got here - and didn't regret it. It was a great experience - hundreds of dolphins swimming...