Akaroa

08/01/12-11/01/12

Time to get out of the city centre, so I had booked a few nights stay in a small French settlement called Akaroa on the Banks Peninsular south of Christchurch. The drive there went pass several attractive sights in the form of mountains and lakes, topped by the view from the top of the road down into the bays. Arriving in the early afternoon I followed the coast line through town to the site where the British flag was raised when we claimed the territory several days before the French settlers arrived. After I took a quick hike up the local roads to get familiar with the stunning landscape before doing hikes I had planned for the following days.

With a hike planned up to the peak I awoke to find that the weather had turned nasty during the night and a low cloud had settled over the surrounding hills. After waiting all morning and with the cloud cover rising I decided to take a gamble and make my way up on the Skyline walk to the peak. It was not an easy climb, very steep paths and lack of fitness meant I had to take several stops on the way up to catch my breath. Getting nearer to the peak the cloud was shifting so instead of going to the summit as I had planned I had to instead take the lower path which missed it out. Even here the cloud was low enough to reduce visibility as I was partly swallowed up by the misty mountains. As I made my descent down a stony road by the time I had got to the bottom the cloud had finally passed - I had been around an hour too early.

The next day I choose to take a different path to the top following the Round the Mountains route, this proved to be less steep than the other route I had taken the day before but the last leg of it was along a public road. Eventually I was back at the path to the summit so with clear skies I finally started to take the ascent to the top. The path was very overgrown and by the time I had got to the top I was suffering from hay fever and my skin had had a reaction to a local plant. But despite this the view from the summit was amazing; I had climbed to a height of 800m that day. Back in town I took a well-deserved dip in the sea at the small beach.

Time to head back to Christchurch, but with the morning spare I visited the local Akaroa museum to learn background history to the town. On the return journey we stopped off at a local cheese factory to taste some of their fare. Arriving at my hostel that night I came just in time for the free bbq they were having that evening. Sitting down with my plate of sausages I was soon offered two free beers, not a bad end to my time in Christchurch.