My good friends, Linda and Francis (I do not have many of these! :P) came to visit us from Singapore, and we planned a 7-day-South Island road trip. They were very nice and paid for a 4-ppl campervan and our air tickets to Christchurch! Each of us have a small role to play on the trip - Hannah (the planner), Francis (the cook), Linda (the caretaker) and me (the driver)....
We took an early flight from Auckland to Christchurch airport. Linda had never really fly domestic airlines before (there is no flying in between Singapore!), and she was pleasantly surprised that she does not need to show her passport, nor does she need to take off her shoes during security check....
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| Hannah waiting for the flight with her usual " Do not take pics of me" look :) |
Arriving in Christchurch airport, picked up the campervan, which took a long time. We had to wait for nearly 40mins (which I still have no idea why!). And off we go to Countdown to do some shopping and stock up the grocery we need for the trip. Again, Francis and Linda said she would be paying for the grocery. I was grateful because there was a lot of food! Both Francis and Linda are vegetarian but Francis was very happy to cook non-vegetarian food for Hannah and I. However, we wanted to keep things simple, and would love the opportunity to take a vegetarian break for the week.
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| Look at the amount of shopping! |
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| Linda is here to inspect the campervan |
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| Washing the utensils before any meals! |
Stop by the road side for a quick snack and off we go to the West coast through Arthur's Pass. It is the highest pass in New Zealand (920 m), and we were worried that it may get too windy and driving in a tall campervan would prove to be challenging.
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| Snack by the road side/ highway |
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| Francis made bruschetta ! |
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| Hannah a better look this time... at least she is smiling |
It was a long day and by the time we reached Arthur's Pass Village, it was already late, and it was raining quite heavily. Thus, we camped at the Department of Conservation (DOC) site. It was a nice camping site, although we got to sleep in the nice comfort of the campervan! There are two queen size beds and it was comfortable! The camp site has a nice view of waterfalls coming down from the mountain, and a railway through it. However, the rain was too heavy to take any beautiful photos. Dinner for the night was curry!... Although it was challenging to cook in a small place, Francis live up to expectations and we had a delicious dinner. It was so good that it makes me wonder how are we going to top this evening's dinner on the trip, but Francis has more surprises!
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| Arthur's Pass Village DOC campsite |
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| Curry for dinner! |
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| The chef, Francis at work! |
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