As most of you will already know, I flew down to Christchurch this weekend to do a spot of skiing. I packed my bag on Friday afternoon and met up with my friend Gihan, who I know through anatomy demonstrating. We got on the bus at the Ferry Terminal and headed to the airport. Once we had arrived, we waited for Gihan's friend James and then all checked in together. We just had enough time for a quick beer and then boarded the plane. Air New Zealand are definitely my favourite airline by far. We got a snack on the plane consisting of some cheese (cheddar and brie), some biscuits and grapes, all washed down with a glass of wine. Considering the journey is just over an hour, that's pretty good going. I hope you are reading this Easyjet and Ryanair, you have a lot to live up to!!
Once we arrived in Christchurch we located our rental car and headed to our accommodation in Methven. We took the scenic route to Methven, but unfortunately it was too dark to see anything. We got to our hostel at about 10.30pm, dropped off our bags and then drove back into town to try and find food and drink. Methven is absolutely tiny though, so all we managed to get was a bar snack, but they were pretty good nachos. We also had a couple of beers before heading back to our accommodation. The room was pretty basic, but nice and clean, with a good hot shower so there were no complaints.
On Saturday we got up early and put on our thermals ready for a day of skiing. We had some toast and jam and looked over the snow report for Mount Hutt. We were very disappointed to discover that it was going to be a windy day and most of the ski lifts at Mount Hutt would be closed. The owners of the hostel advised us to travel a bit further and try Porters Ski Field. It's a little smaller than Mount Hutt but is sheltered from the wind and they said it would probably be a bit quieter than Mount Hutt. We followed their advice and drove firstly to rent equipment (the rental guy was from near to St Andrews!), and then travelled using the scenic route, to Porters Ski Field. On the way we stopped at a couple of places and I got some good photos of Rakaia River (famous for its turquoise blue waters, I'm not sure my photos do it justice!), the mountains we were heading towards, and even stopped in Sheffield (yes there's one in NZ too) at the 'world famous' Sheffield Pie Shop.
We reached Porters Ski Field at about 10am, got suited and booted, and then picked up our lift passes. Gihan and I made our way to the beginners slope to get warmed up, while James went straight up the mountain on the lifts.
After a few runs on the beginners slope I plucked up the courage to get on the lifts and headed to the top of the mountain with James. I was glad I did, as the views were spectacular!
After a few runs down the mountain we decided to break for lunch. We had a hot drink at the cafe and a couple of raspberry and white chocolate muffins each. I chose a hot chocolate which was delicious and made with real chocolate.
After lunch then we went back on to the mountain. Unfortunately by this time the weather had begun to close in, so my pictures from the top weren't quite so clear, and eventually they closed a couple of the lifts. By this time though we weren't too bothered as we were all shattered. I had got to the point where I was falling over a lot because I was so tired, and was consequently collecting a lot of bruises.... it was probably best I stopped when I did!!
We left the ski fields late afternoon and got back to the accommodation at about 5.30. We went to the local supermarket and bought ingredients for a spaghetti bolognese. James had offered to cook, and he made enough to feed the entire population of Methven! It was absolutely delicious though, and afterwards we settled down in the living room to watch The Lord of The Rings The Two Towers. I nearly fell asleep several times, and was glad when the film finished and I could go to bed.
The next morning we got up early again ready to ski, but unfortunately the snow report was pretty bad for the day. Since we were all tired and the weather was going to be bad, we made the executive decision to spend the day in Christchurch instead. This suited me fine as I had never been to Christchurch before, and was looking forward to seeing the city. We all went back to bed for another couple of hours until check-out time.
I'll put our day in Christchurch as a separate post in the blog as it's quite late here now and I will have to get up for uni tomorrow. Will hopefully update the Christchurch part tomorrow, but if not will definitely do so on Wednesday!
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