"Six Chairs Missing" - What A Great Name

Monday 18 December

Breakfast was a continuation of the party last night, with more farewells and hugs and kisses as everyone went their separate ways – many going home to get ready for Christmas, while others were stopping on the way home, to elongate their holiday by a few days.

We had all arranged to meet around 09.00 for breakfast, so it was quite late by the time we were ready to explore Christchurch a bit more. Our first task was to investigate the shops in search of yet another camera – Colin had tried ours under different conditions, and although fine when taking photos indoors, as soon as we went outside in the sun, the centre of the picture “bloomed” and smudged. As we still have four months to go on our travels, including Easter Island and South America, we would want the piccys to be good, so the decision was to buy another camera – the same version, as we already had extra batteries and memory sticks for it. We found the Sony centre, and an engineer looked at the lens, and declared it damaged (we still feel it probably just has a bit of sediment on it from the water drying inside, and could possibly be cleaned – but he was the expert). The salesman offered us a reduction on the price as it was a “service query”. We spent a couple of hours wandering around the shops in Christchurch looking in other camera shops. There really is a very British feel to this town, with Ballantynes, a large department store having its windows decorated with scenes from Christmas Fairy Tales, just like Selfridges used to have years ago. We also looked at long sleeved Tshirts for me – I still only have a cardigan and one long sleeved top – and having experienced the cold here in New Zealand, wondered if that was enough for the very south of South America. I didn’t think I could wear the merino/possum woolly jumpers that are famous in New Zealand, they seemed a bit itchy, but I did find a zipped cardi in warm Tshirt material (not too much extra weight I hope). So we returned to the Sony Centre and bought the camera – white this time – unfortunately the pink one was out of stock everywhere – and then revisited the Tshirt shop and bought me an extra top.

By now it was time for a quick snack in Starbucks – we had their Christmas sandwich of turkey, cranberry and brie between us – before taking a tour of the town on a tram – we met Helen from the tour with her daughter, who were also catching the sights. The trams are old 1905 trams that were only installed here about five years ago, but have been a hit with the tourists. They clang round the streets in a circular route, ringing their bell to let pedestrians know they are behind them. We had been given tickets entitling us to ride for free for a whole day- hopping on and off at will when we first visited the city a week ago, but had not had time to use them then – so now was our first opportunity. The whole way round only takes 30 minutes, but there is lots to see on the way – botanical gardens, statues galore, old style houses and buildings – the University of Christchurch Canterbury is a replica of the universities in Oxford and Cambridge back home – grey gothic buildings, with pointy windows and large expanses of lawns separating the different buildings. There are eleven stops in all, each with its own particular landmark/s to see. We were also spotting restaurants to eat in tonight, and not far from the hotel, the tram route went down New Regent Street – a small road full of restaurants and cafes all offering different styles of food. So when we arrived back in the Square, later in the afternoon, we retraced the tram rails and explored further. We finally decided we would try “Six Chairs Missing” – quirky name, and splendid sounding bistro food. There is a Restaurant Tram, but on making enquiries this morning we were told it was fully booked tonight – but that would have been good, riding around the city whilst eating our meal.

We returned to the hotel, blogged a while, and then walked back to the restaurant once more. The eating area was upstairs in a small shop, with the cooking area taking up most of the ground floor. There were only another couple of tables taken when we arrived, and the waitress was still writing up the wine menu on the blackboard, but we were given food menus to start our selection. We shared a bruchetta which had feta cheese and red onion marmalade liberally spooned on the top, followed by rack of lamb for Colin (he is still on his lamb fetish) and I had salmon stuffed with scallops with a lemony crust. We shared a rum and raisin bread and butter pudding with butterscotch sauce for dessert (does that sound like me?). Both meals were delicious – some of the best food we have eaten in New Zealand, and so much better than the fare from several of the hotels we have visited – and inexpensive too. The atmosphere was very relaxed and friendly – one young Japanese couple came in and just had a creamy/ice cream dessert, but they were just as warmly welcomed as the rest of us. It’s the sort of place that made us feel sad to be leaving Christchurch, as we couldn’t come back for more.

We wandered back to our hotel, in the corner of the Square. It was around 22.30 but everything was very quiet, hardly any other souls about – a bit like Trafalgar Square without any people or traffic. Everyone must be home preparing for Christmas – just a week away now.