Well this is a bit different!

Luxury: over. Being waited on: finished. Clean towels every day: at an end. Luxuriating in cascading showers morning and evening: a thing of the past. We are now ‘slumming it’! We collected the campervan from the Maui office in Christchurch, about an hour and a half drive from our wonderful night in Hanmer Springs (we’re going back there, even if we can’t stay in the motel again. When I went to pay this morning I walked in and, with dead straight face, ‘revealed’ that Heather and I were, in fact, hotel judges and I was sorry to report that ….. their motel had won every one of our ‘best of …’ categories! She looked very worried when I sounded official, still a bit when I said we weren’t really but that we were judging every place we stayed in (18 so far!) and ‘I regretted to have to inform…’ and then she seemed pleased to have even our accolade. And quickly asked us to send a comment to Trip Advisor!)

This is just the lounge of the two bedroom apartment we had in Hanmer Springs for about £80 the night!!

Anyway, on our route to the airport we saw nothing of the quake and its aftermath and as we drove away and out the other side the same applied. It just seems extraordinary that so much damage could be done about 5kms from where we were and there was not one single sign of it. It was interesting to talk to the woman who dealt with us describing how she was outside the office dealing with campervans and had to hold on to something to stop herself falling over when it hit. As we drove away there were home made signs offering accommodation in people’s homes: the only shortage seems to be of bottled water and that is only very near the city.

We got our DVD instructions about our van: it’s a small caravan with an engine at the front really, and very cleverly designed. My, this is going to be fun: making our bed every night and taking it apart every morning!! But, I tell you what, we are going to be able to get right inside some of the most amazing scenery I have ever seen, anywhere.

John and Coral are parked next to us for our first night.

They have done this before so if we have any doubts about what plugs into what we can shout for help. I am talking campervan here!  We asked Coral if she might do a Barbra Windsor impersonation a la ‘Carry on Camping’ but she’s still deciding who might play Sid James.