Our itinerary called for a train trip to Arthur's Pass. By the time we arrived in Christchurch it had become obvious to all of us that spending our one day in Christchurch on a train heading away and then back in the evening was not the right answer. Over a wonderful supper of barbecued lamb and vegetables we made a plan to spend the morning at the botanical gardens, taking the bus tour through the "red zone" and the "restart mall"' then head for the Antarctica exhibit in the afternoon. I don,t have works to describe Christchurch. Beth sat in the seat behind Claire and me, and occasionally gasped or choked up at what she saw. This was her first visit into the red zone since Feb 2012, and although there was no damage she had not been aware of and had seen in pictures and videos, the reality of the devastation was at times overwhelming. Bearing in mind that Christchurch is the South Island's largest city and commercial and business hub, the fact that virtually every building in the central core has either come down, is scheduled for demolition, or scheduled for assessment and/or repair is almost beyond one's ability to appreciate. we saw entire residential neighbors of hundreds of homes which were uninhabitable and scheduled for demolition. We never got to the vast, primarily residential, section of lowland to the east of the city that was shaken, and consequently enveloped in salt water, a process referred to as "liquefaction". Ironically the Christchurch economy is doing rather well in one sense as cranes and work crews are everywhere. Tourism, a major industry here, has all but dried up owing to hotel destruction, heritage site destruction, and the rebuilding process itself.
Beth was a great tour guide. We had lunch at a cafe in the restart mall, a collection of shipping containers and shops being resurrected in the former shopping district. One can already see, 18 months later, how life will one day return to some semblance of normal. the Antarctica exhibit was different from what I had expected but no less interesting. no a word of Shackleton and only a few about Scott, but lots of information on the geology, weather, flora and fauna of this remote region.
We took Beth out for supper at a Thai restaurant then headed home for a glass of wine and off to bed.
