Road trip 2: Canterbury and Otago region 23-26 Jan 09 – Oamaru
This is where the highlight of my trip was!! You will know why later.
Woke up really early in the morning to enjoy the beautiful Tekapo before leaving for Oamaru
Had a hot pie for breakfast just outside our hotel room. Notice the bird eyeing my food...
In less than a minute, I was confronted by all these! Tell me, how can I enjoy my breakfast with so many eyes looking? (>_<)
Just when we left Tekapo, we had a picture stop at this beautiful Lake Pukaki, not very far from Tekapo. Gosh, I was astounded!
Speechless
Wordless
Saw these hays people while entering Kurow. What a happy family! SO CUTE can?
Aww.....look at the doggie. I want I want!
Finally arrived into Oamaru....Had a light lunch before we tried our luck in finding my long coveted mission.
Nachos
Wedges
My mission of visiting a sunflower field has finally been accomplished today, after many years of searching. You have no idea how delighted I was when I saw this sea of yellow. I was over the moon, back and over the sun!! I was like a mad cow climbing over the fence (with owner's permission) running across the thick and long grassland towards the sunflowers. Any road blocks would be kicked out of the way, no mercy! Muahahahaha.
I love this picture very much. Very peaceful and refreshing.
After the sunflower craze, we drove back to our motel for a cool down. The sweltering hot weather was just too much to take I felt like I was going to melt away and desperately needed a cool shower and some rest.
Later, we drove about 25 mins to Moeraki Boulders where you could find many big dinosaurs’ eggs lying along Koekohe beach. Ok lah, there are not dinosaurs’ eggs, but some sort of huge, spherical heavy (several tonnes) stones which have been exposed as a result of erosion from the cliffs along the beach. Quite an interesting sight really.
Alien eggs
More alien eggs
The Alien!! Muahahaha
Muahahahaha, this is so funny! Rick crack the eggs with his 如來神掌.
As we were about to leave Moeraki to stuff ourselves with instant noodles for a quick fixed in our motel, an impromptu decision brought us to this one and only restaurant in Moeraki for dinner, and boy wasn't I glad we did that. The food was just incredibly scrumptious. It was heavenly!
Fish 'n' chips
Chicken burger
Some random pics taken in at night
It was a hot and quiet night. The star lights were bright. Simply beautiful!
Here is the video clip
Labels: food/drinks, leisure, New Zealand road trip, travel/adventure
Shopping spree 5-1
We had a shopping madness today. Rick gone all crazy and beats me 5 to 1 hands down! (>_<). I don't know what has got into him. Suddenly everything he saw, he wanted to buy. *faint*
Still can't get over the fact that I lost! (>_<)
Labels: notepad
Road trip 2: Canterbury and Otago region 23-26 Jan 09 – Lake Tekapo
My 2nd road trip, in just a week after the first one. I must say it was pretty tiring though this 2nd one was actually a bit more leisure than the 1st. I believe it is the cascading exhaustion from the 1st one. By the time we were back from this 2nd trip, I was really not looking forward to the 3rd one coming in 1.5 week. 3 road trips in the span of 3.5 weeks, all the results of spontaneous decisions due to the cheap flights that came in almost the same time.
This 2nd trip took 4 days 3 nights. We flew off to Christchurch on Friday 23th Jan and started our journey right away to Lake Tekapo for a night. Then, to Oamaru and back to Christchurch on 25th Jan for CNY eve. We flew back the next day.
Our first stop, Lake Tekapo. I was there one winter long long time ago. Due to the disappointment I had with Lake Wanaka, I didn't put much hope on Tekapo this time. As much as l would like to be optimistic, I hate to be disappointed again. Funny how things always turn out better when you least expected it. I can still clearly remember I was like "WOAH!!" with eyes as big as you could imagine as soon as the lake came in sight. I had never seen a lake that beautiful. The turquoise colour water beat Wanaka hands down! I don't remember Tekapo being this beautiful the last time I was there.
Toyota this time!
The famous Collie Dog Statue
Chapel of the Good Shepperd
The perfect place for a romantic wedding
Our dinner for the night.....
Labels: food/drinks, leisure, New Zealand road trip, travel/adventure
My Valentine at Plate
Valentine's day dinning at this retro chic restaurant in Holiday Inn, Plate. The service was good, food quite nice too. They put us in a little corner all my ourselves, nice and quiet (^_^). The only drawback was they couldn't produce the crème brûlée I ordered. Their hand-held torch is broken :(
Capsicum with stuffed feta
Coupled with deep fried squid ring with rivioli
Grilled Salmon
Steak cooked to medium
Labels: Event/Celebration, food/drinks
Southland Otago road trip: Dunedin
Only 2 hours of driving today, we were pretty laid-back, taking it easy. We reached Balclutha after about 30 mins drive from Kaka Point. Man, this town looked just like a ghost town early in the morning.
Balclutha township *shudder*
The (ghost) bridge!
Saw this when we were just about entering Dunedin district
Awww......a love shape lawn! How romantic. It is a private land. Must be for the wife. Hehehe
Dunedin, the Edinburgh of the South houses the very first New Zealand university and has been regarded as New Zealand's architectural heritage capital. There are a lot of well kept Victorian and Edwardian buildings in the city. A trip back to Dunedin brought back a lot of memories. Standing right in front of the famous Otago University clock tower, I wallowed in my time here as a 1st year university student. All the dormant images suddenly came to life flushing back like a movie film, non-stop. And it is still running as I am typing this entry.
We first made a visit to the newly built Chinese Garden. Small but beautiful.
Facade of the Chinese Garden
Dunedin old train station (still in operation though)
We then had our lunch at one Japanese restaurant
Dunno what name Church. Sorry, forgot the name.
We later made our way to the one and only castle in New Zealand, Larnach Castle, built in 1871.
A lot of things has changed after so many years, new campus buildings, new hostels/student apartments etc. I asked Rick to take me back to Dalmore Convent House, the hostel I stayed. Amazingly, the house is still standing strong (It was very very old and kind of shabby by the way). But the surrounding has changed so much that I almost got lost in the area. New student apartments have been built all around it and the grass field where we used to have our snow fight has long gone, so is the goat.
Rick was stunned seeing the convent house, he couldn't believe this is the place I stayed. It is so run-down that he thinks it is not a house for human but "something" else. Hahahahaha. Well, it was the cheapest hostel at that time! And, yes, I did hear some scary stories about the house while staying there! *shudder*
Otago University Clock tower
It is the oldest university in New Zealand and definitely the best place for studying if you fancy those old european atmosphere
Old train station at dusk
We visited the world steepest street the next morning and indulged ourselves in scrumptious breakfast before jetting back to Wellington.
World steepest street - Baldwin street
Here is the short video clip
~The end of Southland Otago road trip~
Labels: food/drinks, leisure, New Zealand road trip, travel/adventure
Southland Otago road trip: Queenstown-Gore-Bluff-Invercargill-Kaka Point
ilWe had quite a bit to cover today. If we had bypassed Gore, we would have arrived into Catlins 30 mins earlier, but Rick insisted on dropping by Gore because he so wanted to take a photo of the big fish statue. Ya, Gore is a small town, dubbed the world capital of brown trout fishing, whatever that means. Since he was the one driving, I better kept my mouth shut to not get thrown out of the car! Hahaha.
Yeah, this fish it is!
After Gore, we made our way to Bluff, located at the bottom of the South Island. Funny name isn't it? I wonder what we would call the locals there, bluffer? Muahahahahaha. Ok, I shouldn't make fun of the oldest European settled town in New Zealand.
Tokyo, Tokyo I love you!
Had our lunch at this cafe. Drunken Sailor, what a creative name eh?
Sipping my latte
See, see we got Pig Island!!!! Pigi would love to go there and meet his friends! LOL
Then, also got Dog Island wor. Vell would be thrilled to go there. Muahaha
Nah, this is Dog Island lah, but Pig Island is no where in sight. Too far liao I think.
A brief stop at Invercagill to have a look around since it was my first visit there. Nothing much really, just like any ordinary small town.
Invercargill water tower
St Mary's Basilica
Finally arriving into Kaka Point in Catlins after around 2.5-hour drive following the southern scenic route from Invercagill. Upon arriving into Kaka Point, we made a trip to Nugget Point (about 15 mins drive). A 10 mins walk took us to the lighthouse where we enjoyed spectacular view of the coast with scattering rocky islets. There were a lot of seals spotted along the walking track and on the rocky islets lolling about, swimming and playing around. Wish I could get a little bit more closer to them. They're such cute creatures. We didn't manage to do the "hide-and-wait" for the yellow-eyed penguins as it was starting to rain. 
Love this pic!
The nuggets! Yum?!?
By the way, just got an award from the sweet Josephine! Thank you sweetie! (^_^)
Rules:
1. Copy Badge “2008 Cute’s Blogger Award” and put it on your blog
2. Link or tell a bit about the person who gave you the award.
Josephine, knew her not very long and still trying to know more about this young lady. All I know is she is got this sweet smile that would kill all your worries.
3. Each one of you who receive this award must list down 10 facts / hobbies about yourself...
1. I LOVE travelling.
2. I am passionate about beauty and fashion.
3. I hate windy day.
4. I am only 161 cm (damn short).
5. I am an animal lover but don’t like cat.
6. I like taking photo also like being photographed.
7. I play piano and would love to own a grand piano one day.
8. I don’t drink alcohol.
9. I used to want to be an air stewardess. Damn the height and short sighted eye sight.
10. I treasure my love ones very very much.
Oh, and I am suppose to pass this on to 10 bloggers. Well, I give it to all of you lah since you all so cute!
Labels: food/drinks, leisure, New Zealand road trip, travel/adventure
Woke up really early in the morning to enjoy the beautiful Tekapo before leaving for Oamaru
Had a hot pie for breakfast just outside our hotel room. Notice the bird eyeing my food... 
In less than a minute, I was confronted by all these! Tell me, how can I enjoy my breakfast with so many eyes looking? (>_<)
Speechless
Wordless
Saw these hays people while entering Kurow. What a happy family! SO CUTE can?
Aww.....look at the doggie. I want I want!
Nachos
Wedges
I love this picture very much. Very peaceful and refreshing.
Alien eggs
More alien eggs
The Alien!! Muahahaha
Muahahahaha, this is so funny! Rick crack the eggs with his 如來神掌.
Fish 'n' chips
Chicken burger
