NZ- Making like a Kiwi

Travel from Fiji to New Zealand was really smooth. Really, all of the travel so far has been (knocking furiously on wood). We arrived in Christchurch, got to our RV rental place, got the tour of everything, saw that the food delivery (complete with beer) had arrived and was in the RV, and set off toward the southern lakes. We made it as far as Geraldine, where we pulled into our first official campground, The Farmyard.

Being new to this campground thing, we weren't quite sure what to do. So we drove in and the lady at the office told us to pick a spot we liked, and come back to pay. So we did. Later, we learned that we'd picked a non-powered site - something we wouldn't do again when paying for it. But that was okay, and we chatted with some really nice Kiwis in the morning.

Also in the morning, we woke up, had some breakfast in our RV, took showers, and went to check out the farm animals. C-man was thrilled, practically hugging every bunny and guinea pig and cuni cuni pig.

After checking all of that out, we moved further South toward the lakes. We saw Lake Tekapo. It was stunning.

And, of course, the church to the sheepdogs. We had to go in there!

And then we saw Lake Pukaki,which was just as stunning. C-man was napping in the RV, recovering a bit from his virus as well as all the travel and sunburn, so our stop was brief, and we kept moving forward.

As we navigated our way forward, we encountered several one-lane bridges. They are clearly marked as to who has the right of way, but you do need to pay attention when they come up and don't just plow across. Not to mention, they don't leave a lot of room for larger vehicles.

We finally parked our RV for the night in an area by Diamond Lake. There was no power, and there was a marked walk to what I'm sure was a lake somewhere. But really all I saw were a bunch of sheep. We were tired after the hours of driving and all the travel, though, so it didn't really matter.

Overall, the trip has been smooth. Figuring out RV living has had its quirks (make sure everything is locked down and constantly reminding Beerman to stay on the left, especially with turns!), but it’s been good, too. I don’t know how we’d be able to see it all (ie Get all my sheep photos) without doing it like this. (Because I’m certainly not getting on one of those awful tour buses!) We've figured out the roads (thankfully, we've driven on the left side enough elsewhere), and Beerman understands the right of way rules on the bridges and roundabouts, having been here before.

And now, we continue our way through the South Island...