We have made it to New Zealand- the land of the KIWIS

We arrived in Christchurch last night at around 8:00pm but we had another time chance so it was really 3 hours earlier for us, so we were sort of ready to take on the town and still needed to get some dinner. We got a shuttle from the airport to our hostel and then headed out into the town. Apparently people start going out at 11:00 so we were right on time :)

We went to an Irish pub because it was really busy, most people were in jeans and flips, and there was a live Irish band. Oh, and they had food. We went in and realized the food was really just bar munchies so we settled on a bucket of fries for dinner and got some pints while we watched the band and some people playing pool. I even spotted a sox hat so we felt right at home there. We decided that we love the Irish. Back to the Kiwis, though. We ended up making fun of the pool players that kept losing and they were real live local kiwis. So, we picked their brain about tipping etiquette and what we needed to do in NZ. They proceeded to give us directions to Queenstown which consisted mostly of if you get to some town you've gone to far and just go straight. They were really nice and actually at one point started talking politics to us. We realized that Americans have no idea what is going on in the rest of the world. We know what is going on with Americans, pretty well even. But for NZ-ers to ask us who we were coting for and actually had an opinion on candidates was interesting to us.

We hit another bar that had a band with them then headed back to our hostel. We got up this morning and went to rent a car. To our surprise, we ended up with a VAN. It seats 8, yes 8 people. We can sleep in the thing. Actually, we only wanted a small car but got the van becasue the company needed it dropped off in our ending city so gave us a bargain on it and for the same price as the car. So, we are living out of a van this week and loving every second of it. Our drive today included the bluest lake I've ever seen calle Lake Tepako, a trek up to Mt Cook, bounded by a glacier, and another lake called Pukaki or something. THe lakes are amazingly bue and with the contrast of the green trees and the white snow capped mountains, it was an amazingly scenic drive.

However, we didn't gauge the gas thing very well on day one. So becasue its late and we can't get gas, we are staying in a campground (holiday park) tonight in our van in the middle of a town called Omarama. You can try to look it up but I'm not sure you will find anything. pop 355. tonight its up to 357. Heading off to the most adventurous city in the world tomorrow- QUEENSTOWN! We might pick up some hitchhikers to pay off our gas on the way- 6 open seats!!! (dad- I'm kidding)