Living Like a Small Green Hairy Fruit

School Hols

21 September 2007 - 7 October 2007

Unlike the UK the 4 school terms are 10 weeks long, followed by 2 weeks break.  Me and the kids spent most of the hols with our friend Helen and her two children, all roughly the same ages.

The first week was quite peaceful really as we swopped children; Helen daughter slept over here with Kaela and Helen had her son and Andrew.  For 3 days! So no arguing or fighting just peace in both households. What bliss! 

We took them to the Antartic Centre near the airport in Christchurch.  Bit pricey on the entrance fee at $135 for a family ticket (2 ad, 4 kids) but that did include a Hagglund ride.  The lady on ticket sales naturally assumed Helen and I were Australian (?), we said no, we're from Rangiora, which raised a puzzled look.  The Antarctic Centre is crammed full of information, is well laid out and has some good interactive stuff.  We went in the wind chill room. You have to put on thick jackets and rubber over shoes before going in. The room has snow and ice, with an slide made of ice blocks, a tent, snow ski etc and is made up to look like the landscape of Antartica.  There's a wind chill thermometer and you can operate the fan to see how low you can get the temperature. Think kids got it down to -21deg wind chill factor!  Then they start the fans and the overhead monitor shows you the wind speed, wind chill, etc.  There were shelter areas for anyone to go to if it got too much.  Helen, in a very concerned, loving and gentle motherly way pointed them out to her kids and told them to go if they were two cold.  I instructed my two to stay put no matter what!  Paid a bloody fortune for this so the least they could do was stay put and soak up the whole experience!

 The Wind Chill Room before they turned the fans on

The Hagglund ride was so cool.  Takes 5 in the front car and 11 in the back. The driver said the front car is more scenic, the back car gets a wilder ride - so the kids made a beeline for the back car.  You get heaps of information on the vehicle, what it is capable of, where and what it is used for, etc, which was great, except I've forgotten all of it as I was more interested in holding on tight! The driver said it even crosses cravasses (sp?) and to prove it we did, several times! Oh, and it goes in water to, which we did.  Awesome experience but didn't last nearly long enough!

We stopped then for lunch, we had a picnic outside and Helen got totally fleeced in the cafe. After that it was packed lunches every outing.

Then it was time to see the Little Blue Penguins being fed which was really sweet but boy what a bunch of weirdos!  Apparently they are all there as they've either been hit by boats or attacked by dogs, cats, etc, so every penguin is a little deranged, brain damaged, nervous, blind or partially disabled.  There's one that does nothing more than hide up in the bushes. One that spends all day padding along the window ledge between heat lamps.  One that bites everyone and everything. One with huge pink rubber shoes on as she had corns(?).  A couple that are scared of the water so have to be fed on land.  It was funny and sad at the same time, if you know what I mean.  When I told Mark he commented that basically I'd paid a fortune for the kids to visit the Penguin Psychiatric Ward. And well, yeah, that's more of less what it was.

We took them out and about, shopping at The Palms (or Palm Springs as Helen likes to tell everyone!), which the boys were very good about as the girls needed jeans and we needed to shop for Mark's birthday so it was like a lifetime to them sat in girly shop doorways hanging around whilst various styles and makes of jeans were tried and discarded.

We took the kids and the dogs to Waikuku beach for a picnic.  Bit chilly in the wind but a really nice day and it was great to see the kids running around like they were little again. The girls lying down in the sea, the boys burying each other in the sand and running and hiding in the dunes.  Once the picnic was handed round Leo, having dragged himself from the waves, decided to trot into the middle of our little camp to shake; well you can't expect to go to the beach and not get sand in your sandwich, but me thinks it was a little unnecessary!

And we also visited Orana Wildlife Park. We couldn't go in the feeding cage as they only had 1 ticket left available but we did watch to see what happens and will definitely have to go back with Mark and Helen's husband Steve cos that is just one experience you wouldn't want to miss!

Orana (means safe haven) was so much bigger than we'd expected and heaps of animals but all kept in great habitats, not just small, dank cages.  Every animal has a feeding time you can see and where possible they try and make it accessible to the public.  Like, we got to feed the giraffes! That was cool. We we each given a twiggy, leafy branch and told to hold it up and make like a tree.  Giraffes have the weirdest blue/black tongues that wrap around the stick and shear off the leaves so you have to hold onto your 'branch' tight!

There's a train - well a tractor actually pulling two carriages - that goes around the park with an informative talk and lots of drop off/pick up points.

Have put some pics on but am definitely going back to Orana so will do a proper bit on that once we have.