we had to wake up really early today to catch the free shuttle at 7am to the train station. across from the station is a bunnings store, (just think home depot), which is a bit of a joke between us and a friend of ours so we couldn't help but giggle and take a picture. in honor of twiddle thumbs's birthday we are riding the tranz alpine today.

tranz alpine train ride

the tranz alpine makes it journey between christchurch on the east coast and greymouth on the west coast of the south island. it is supposed to be a gorgeous train ride worth it for the journey itself. there is a bus transportation that runs along the same route and is slightly cheaper. we opted to ride the train both ways just for the scenery.

thinking deep thoughts

we passed through rolleston, darfield, sheffield, springfield, the staircase viaduct, mt. white bridge, bealey bridge, arthur's pass national park, otira, jacksons, inchbonnie, moana, brunner. the route runs along the waimakariri river (maori for "cold water") for much of the journey. it's all pretty much extremely small towns and nature. the total length is 231km and it passes through 16 tunnels. this is supposed to be the great train ride of new zealand but it wasn't that great. in fact, i think the taieri gorge ride was much better. maybe the tranz alpine is only beautiful when there are snow-capped mountains. what was cool was that at one point we saw tons of pukekos in this one spot. it was a sight to see but my camera wasn't ready so it's only a memory.

art gallery at night

we had to pay a fee for the return shuttle. we asked to be dropped off at the christchurch art gallery (free admission). they are open until 9pm on wednesday nights and we arrived shortly after 7pm so we had plenty of time to check it out. the art on display wasn't that great. however, the gift shop was pretty cool. i picked up a shirt that people will probably think i got at disneyland. no, sorry, i got this one in new zealand. it's the image of mickey mouse morphing into a tiki style face. "mickey to tiki tu meke".