Mount Cook to Chrstchurch

Well this makes a change,  today I was woken by the alarm...not Maria's coughing.  She seems to be getting better, at least she got a decent nights sleep.  I think about this as I hobble about the room: gout has flared up in my right foot.  At the moment it is agonising, but if I'm not lucky it will soon be excrutiating.

We couldn't be bothered to pack last night so we packed this morning - forcing stuff into far more bags and carrier bags than we should have and so we just about checked out by the last check out time of 10am.  Having paid yet another exorbitant fee for internet access, we wave Mount Cook goodbye.  It is a fine looking mountain, really attractive - when it is not hidden by rain clouds!

We drive along the lake to Twizel,  Maria driving whilst I grab some snaps from the car window as we travel along.   We stop at Twizel for breakfast,  and sit outside the cafe where we share some of our breakfast with some very bold sparrows.

We decide to take the scenic route to Lake Tekapo which runs along side the canals created as part of the hydro-electric schemes up here.  The water is still the stunning azure blue - we have now learned that this colour is due to "rock flour" in the water from the glaciers that feed the lakes.  For a scenic route it was prettier and quicker than the route along the state highway...result.

After that it was the slow descent down through "Beautiful Valley" and on to the Canterbury plains.  The Canterbury plains make Norfolk look interesting and mountainous.  I am driving now and to relieve the boredom,  I have invented a new game.  Every 5 or so km there is a passing lane added to the road,  they are not particulalry long stretches so I make it my mission to see how many cars/lorries I can overtake in these small stretches of road.  A personal best of 5 makes for a pretty good achievement,  though I may have  exceeded the 100km speed limit on the odd occasion.

Beautiful Valley and some "rolling road blocks"

We found the airport pretty easily and as the hotel was just over the road that was none too difficult either.  We then drove over the road and dropped off the car,  and the nice people at Avis arranged for a lift back to hotel as now my gout had got pretty damn harsh and any kind of walking was proving a bit difficult.



All day I had been throwing far more anti-gout drugs down my throat than I am supposed to,  in a desperate attempt to calm things down and enable walking like a normal person.  But it's really not helping much,  so my kind wife decides to get me some ice,  for use as an ice pack.  This proves some what difficult as the instruction book in the hotel says that there are 3 ice machines at different ends of the hotel..only it lied.  On phoning reception  it turns out that the ice-machines were removed some time ago,  Maria makes her displeasure known to the guy on reception!


After a trip to the restaurant to get an ice bucket - the rest of the evening is spent lying about with an ice pack on my foot.  We even order room service as walking as far as the loo causes real difficulty.  This does not bode well for tomorrow as airports require an awful lot of walking!