Hello!

Sorry for the lack of blog updates but it's been rather hectic for the last couple of weeks!

After gladly finishing my time in crazy Cairns I stayed with friends Warren and Judi in Sydney for a few nights. I found Sydney to be a great city - one of my favourites so far. The sky was mostly clear, the water aqua blue, and the views breathtaking. In some sort of order, whilst there I:

- Did the Sydney Tower for great views of all over the harbour (correctly called Port Jackson NOT Sydney Harbour!) and the Skywalk option which took us outside on a ledge overlooking the city and I had fun mucking about a bit out there, whilst attached to the building with a strong rope.
- Saw Avatar 3D at last on the largest IMAX screen in the world.
- Greatly enjoyed Sydney Wildlife World with animals such as kangaroos, koalas, crocodiles, snakes, massive ants, a cassowary, etc, and really interesting info about them all.
- Wandered around Woollamooloo Wharf, a beautifully restored old pier in one of the bays, and ate at Harry's, a Sydney institution burger bar where Colonel Sanders himself has previously eaten!
- Spent a day in the Blue Mountains (so called because of the effect of the Eucalyptus trees on the colour of the forests), doing a couple of great walks with truly rewarding views of massive scale: valley floors covered with semi-tropical trees and winding rivers.
- Had Eggs Benedict at an outdoor restaurant with a blinding view of the Harbour Bridge and Opera House. It's hard to explain how pretty the view from the northern side of the harbour is, with the bridge looming over on your right and the Opera House facing you on the left, with the clean city skyline between. Day or night, it's one of the very best cityscapes I've seen and made me very happy!
- Went to Manly and North Head to wade in a bit of the Pacific and see a long-range view of the city, proving it's stunning from any angle, and particularly in bright sunshine with a yacht race taking place in the harbour!

Then flew to Christchurch to see Isey and stay with uni friends Poppy, Graham and Yogi for a few days. My bag didn't leave Sydney so had to go off without it :( but was delivered the next day with everything intact :) There's not a huge amount to do in Christchurch but that was perfect at that moment. We spen the first night in Akaroa on the Banks Peninsula, on the East Coast of the South Island, near to Christchurch, and slept in a tiny cabin on stilts with a perspex window at the head end, letting us see the stars in the middle of the night. Also was on a hill and gave a great early morning view of the creamy blue lake below. Met a bunch of Poppy and Graham's friends so had a really fun time with them, also going on a lake cruise the following day. Back in Christchurch Isey and I spent plenty of time canoodling on the grass in the Botanical Gardens, finding it particularly funny when the gardens tour bus drove right past us curled up! We had a half day at Sumner Beach with unbelievable views of the mountains and city not far away. Also spent a morning carving ourselves some cow bone necklaces that pushed our craftsmanship to the max! Isey and I also had a posh date at one of the nicer restaurants in town, celebrating how great it was to be together for a few days. I know it will very soon feel like a dream that we were ever together in Christchurch but it was such a great time for both of us...turns out that a bit of absence does make the heart grow fonder!

Said a second teary goodbye to Isey and shorlty after got myself on the (slightly dreaded) Kiwi Experience bus, which has so far been a great time. We've done a three-legged pub crawl that helped me meet a lot of people, then at Lake Mahinapua we did the sort of famous dinner and fancy dress thing at the old chap's place there. The poor theme was 'Extreme/Eggstreme' so I went as Ray Mears with a funky little hat. That was a really fun night too, with cross-dressers, people dressed as babies, sheep, easter eggs, and all sorts of other unpredictable things. Then today I've been in Franz Josef for the glacier hike which was great. Even when you're on it, it's impossible to comprehend the size of it because all the surrounding scenery is also massive. Big juts at the top of the glacier look like dominoes from the ground but are actually the size of 10-story buildings! There was a lot of clear, blue ice, some tunnels to squeeze through, and steep steps cut into the ice to navigate, as well as dealing with the rain for most of the time! Really enjoyable but great to get back to a shower afterwards!

To quickly sum up New Zealand thoughts so far, it's a beautiful place gifted with landscape reminiscent of bits of the UK (mostly Scotland) but more enormous and inconcievable. Lots of massive mountains and hills carpeted with semi-tropical trees, bright blue rivers, jagged coastlines, and lonely straight roads! The bus is quite good as it stops off at lots of little places along the route between overnight stops and lets us do walks in some really beautiful places. Even if I am doing it with 80 people (we're currently 2 buses travelling together) and know the whole world passes through the same places for the same reason, I still think there are some lovely little walks that we get to do and that's good. I've been good with meeting people so have lots of people to talk to and lots of fun to be had!

So that's up to date and I'll hopefully get on again before too long, but it is busy and I'm doing a lot of stuff!

Love to you all and keep messages coming!

Dave x