Road trip with Francis and Linda - Day 6 (26 Nov)

We woke up early in the morning, and as Hannah suggested, we took the Highcliff road back down the peninsula. The plan is to check out the other side of the peninsula before we drive back to Christchurch. We reached a sign that says "Not suitable for large vehicles". I looked at Hannah and she responded - We are not that large, and off we carried on the road. I was thinking to myself - the road doesn't seem too bad, and then the cement road turned to a very narrow, winding road along a drop-off cliff! At that point, I was praying that there were no cars coming from the other side because this road WILL NOT be able to fit both of us! Lucky for us, it was early enough that there was no traffic. We finally reached our destination, and it was worth the challenging drive. We stopped to do a walk to The Chasm and Lovers Leap - lovely views.

After that, we quickly drove out of the peninsula and headed north on SH1 toward Christchurch. The drive was a bit more challenging today with strong gust of wind along the road. At one point as we were travelling along a bridge between two valleys, the van was literally blew across the middle line! We ended up taking the inland scenic road (SH72, which was about 8km longer) instead of SH1, because it has weaker winds and less huge tractor trailers.

View from the carpark

At the chasm - can spot Hannah.. she is standing at the
edge of a 200m drop! Nerve wrecking

I took A LOT of sheeps' pics that day. They were being good posers.

We stopped in Moeraki to see the giant spherical boulders. I think Francis loved the ways these boulders were formed. He was explaining to us his theory, which made sense to me :)

We ate lunch in Oamaru at the public gardens (which was here since 1876!). Hannah said we should come back here again in another trip to visit the garden since we did not get the chance to walk around much this time.

We stopped at the Rakaia Gorge for more pics before finally hitting Christchurch to cheers and applause. We spent the night at the airports closest campsite, North South Holiday Park. What a trip! :)

Moeraki rocks

Last dinner on the road trip...