Queenstown & Christchurch

After exactly 200 days of travelling, climbing mountains, crossing endless steppes and trekking through dense jungles, we have reached Middle Earth. We still have to travel far through the lands of dwarves, men and elves before reaching Mordor but we are now closer than ever to finishing our quest. On the morning of the 22nd day of the fourth month of this year, our metal eagle landed in the settlement of Queenstown. It is an enchanted place on the shore of a sound (fjord) surrounded by mountains. We had risen long before dawn that day and according to hobbit fashion had packed some breakfast and lunch, and snacks. As we prepared the food as if the time difference of two hours would be the other way, our lunch became a second breakfast (Aussie time) and the snacks became elevensies (NZ time)… but we will never complain about more meals. And no your not allowed to bring fresh food into Middle Earth from the West. It might bring in dangers unknown to the resident beasts and beings. The process of entering this new realm went smoothly and before long we sat in our comfortable lodging in the middle of the settlement. We spend the afternoon exploring Queenstown and preparing some food for our quest of the following day. Before retiring into our beds for the night we still had to exploit the bit of luxury our inn offered us: a room heated by hot stones.

23.4

This day we would go on our first quest in Middle Earth: Finding Ithilien, without being captured by Faramir. We started late that day because we were not used to the new time yet. After breakfast we started our walk along the shore of the sound with the hope to see some Oliphaunts on the way. Our journey led us through golden autumn forests past bushes full of fairies with magnificent views visible through the trees. We stopped for lunch on a plain overviewing the sound and the mountains on the other side. The wind was cold yet the sun was shining and warmed our faces. Two hours later we reached the spot that was marked as Ithilien on our map. However, we did not immediately find the spot where Sam was wishfully thinking of po-tay-toes while arguing with Smeargol about the right way to cook rabbit. We walked through many bushes, climbed a mountain and made friends with a cute little bird. The latter made Sesy proclaim that if it would continue to follow us she would turn into a disney princess. Yet, when we finally reached the destination of our quest, we had more resemblance to Radagast than Snow White. Sadly we did not spot any Oliphaunts but the view over the plain was magnificent. It was afternoon when we started our way back towards the enchanted village. We could not hope to walk back all the way and arrive before dusk so we looked for someone who would be willing to take us back in their carriage. A lovely South African family came to our aid and shortened our journey by multiple hours. We shared stories with the all three generations sharing the carriage with us and the road was covered fast (even if the young son might have spilled the inside of is stomach on Arteyˋs lap. He was three, that can happen). Back in our inn, we made ourselves some dinner, went in the hot stone room and retired to bed early.

24.4.

As the sun rose, so did we, as we were off to our next destination: the city of Christchurch. A relative of the knight bus took us in to bring us safely over the mountains. The driver was as talkative as Stan Shumpike, though far more knowledgeable. He told his guests much about the passing villages, mountains, and fields. We definitely enjoyed that, though we also did not mind that after lunch the driver switched and we could listen to Lord of the rings audiobooks in peace. The lunch spot is worthy to be mentioned though, before I get too hasty as Treebeard would say. It was at Lake Tekapo, according to our driver, the most beautiful spot in New Zealand. It was truly magnificent, yet, we will make up our own mind, if it is truly the most beautiful spot. Late in the afternoon, we arrived at our destination and walked to our Christchurch version of the Leaky Cauldron.

25.4.

We spend the morning of this day being productive: washing our clothes, responding to emails and writing the last blog post. After lunch we ventured out to explore the city of Christchurch. It is much bigger than Queenstown and is still recovering from an earthquake that happened 13 years ago. Nevertheless, we thought it very pretty. Especially the art center and the botanic garden stood out to us. To our delight, the inn in which we were staying had a lot of free food available. So our dinner was a bit bigger than expected. Our breakfast the next morning was also basically just free food too, but what we did the following day is a tale for another time.