Home again

Sad for the holiday to be over as it was a lot of fun, but it's good to be home.

The last couple of days were pretty good. J had caught a cold though so we took it pretty easy. He managed skiing on Thursday (lots of fun going up and down the carpet rides - which is so much easier than walking sideways up the hill to ski down) and Friday was a day of rest and luxury. It was raining in the morning so J took the opportunity to get some much needed rest. I read and watched a movie on tv. Then we walked down to the town to get some lunch and then came back to let J go back to bed. Unfortunately the walk to the town was downhill and back was up a quite steep hill and just the walk tired him out a fair bit.

Late in the afternoon he was feeling a lot better so we went off for a 30 minute float in a floatation tank and then had a 60 minute massage. That massage felt so good! Just what I needed to get rid of the last aches from the skiing (my calves and knees were killing me from the stance you need to use wearing the ski boots).

After some home-made pizzas for dinner with the rest of the group, J and I, as well as two others headed to a place that had lovely hot tubs. They messed up our booking but were still able to squeeze us in after a bit of a wait. These hot tubs were just the perfect way to finish off the holiday. They were big wooden ones (can hold 4 people but we had one to ourselves) and the private room you're in has a retractable wall and ceiling. During the day you get a gorgeous view of the Remarkables mountain range. At night it was mainly the stars with a little of the mountains in there as well. It was just beautiful! And even though there was snow on the ground just outside, you were warm because of the water and steam from the tub. So relaxing.

Saturday we had an afternoon bus ride back to Christchurch, so in the morning J and I saw a movie. Some of the other guys spent the morning walking through the area or having fun on the luge up on Bob's Peak, but J was still quite tired from his cold so we thought it best to take it easy (and stay warm - was still very cold outside!).

Sunday morning we got up and had breakfast in the hotel we stayed at (delicious!) and then most of us headed to the Antarctic Centre just next door. Unfortunately Steve, we didn't get to go on the Haaglund ride, though it looked like fun. There was 10 of us (the other 5 went off sightseeing) and the centre said they'd give us a discount if we all did the same thing and most of the others didn't want to go on the ride. It was a good way to spend the morning though. The penguins were cute (though rather smelly) and the Antarctic storm was an experience. This was a room of snow and ice - kept at -8 C (17.6 F) and then after a 'radio warning' of a storm, they turned on the wind machines so we could experience the wind chill temperature you'd get at the Antarctic. 45 km winds (28 mph) which gave us a wind chill temperature of -18 C (0.4 F). Brrr!

The afternoon and evening was spent in airports and the air. The only disappointment I have with that is that New Zealand doesn't stamp your passport (not sure if that's only because we're from Australia), so my passport pages are still empty. Ah well - will just have to make sure we fill them in someday!

It was too late to pick up Chickie last night so we'll pick him up from school today. I cannot wait to see my little boy! We missed him so much, but it sounded like he had a great time at his grandparent's place, so that's a bit of a relief.