This weekend we had labour day, which means that we had 3 days of from school. we planned a tramp to Akaroa, a small village at the coast in the south of Christchurch, founded by some french whalefishermen in the 19 century.
We started at Saturday morning by quite nice weather. We headed by bus through the tunnel for Littelton, which is the second biggest harbour on the southern island. There we took the ferry to the Diamond Habour.
The tramp to the top of Mt.Herbert needed us 3 hours. with 919m is it one of the highest mountains on the peninsula. our bagpacks where heavy but everyone was in a good mood because last cloudes disappeared. strong wind came up und we started our summitwalk. We enjoyed the spectacular scenery and breathtaking views to the bays.
new zealand offers in one day four seasons - I've never experienced that before: the afternoon got more and more cloudy. We just had pinched up our tents, when it started to rain. We cooked our noodlesoup with 'Wienerli' by strong winds and rainshowers. After that we were very happy to find a cosy place in our tents. During the night the wind got stronger, temperature dropped below zero. It must have been midnight, when the girls shouted: our tent bursts! I was not excited, to leave my sleepingbag - frezzing...heavy gusts... with some tapes I tried to fix torn material, but it was all wet and to cold. a pole was broken.
However, girls weren't gazed about and rested in their not anymore so snuggly home till morning. After breakfast we left the inhospitable place. Our 5 hours walk to Hilltop was an amazing trip. Hard winds and snowshowers disappeared more and more. The changing landscape was just exhilarating, sun got stronger....
After a short taxidrive from Hilltop to Akaroa we met some other Swiss friends from Seafield school in the backpacker. A delishes dinner with fresh fish was the great finish of our unforgetable experience.
At sunday we made a stunning boatcruise... we were able to watch seals, catched a glimpse of the white flippered blue penguins and some endangered rare hectordolphins accompagnied our boat on the open sea!
