C’est Akaroa
Whilst on the topic of doing random blog entries I thought I might do one about Akaroa – yep the tiny French settlement near Christchurch.
On our second visit to Christchurch I decided that I really wanted to make it to Akaroa since we didn’t go the first time, so we asked at our hostels reception and managed to secure a booking for a bus to take us over the following day – if you have a BBH card make sure you mention it cas I saved $5 just for my bus fare alone, regular fares are around $35 return trip and stop off at a few places on the way - we stopped at a really pretty beach (I can’t remember the name) but the beach was incredibly flat and it didn’t have sand but had heaps of flat stones instead! Apparently it can get pretty rough there though, but it was pretty nevertheless. We stopped at a gem factory (?) not really a factory, more like some guys workshop, but it is quiet interesting, we also stopped at the cheese factory and got some free samples on the way home.
We made it to Akaroa after about 1.5hours I think I was – found a bakery to eat lunch and then began wandering around to see what the town had to offer. If you have come by bus it is likely that you will get picked up around 3-4PM, I advise you to take your time looking around as we went around and saw everything we wanted to see and then found ourselves waiting for the bus for nearly an hour, admittedly we didn’t do any of the longer walks which I would have liked to have done if we were staying overnight and didn’t have to catch the bus, and we also only had quick looks in the shops as we didn’t really feel the need to purchase anything.
We managed a few of the quick walks which were mentioned in one of the brochures at the Information Centre, including walking out past the Lighthouse and to an old French Cemetery, both of which were nice easy walks.
On our way back from the walk to the Lighthouse we noticed a small boat which was being pulled out of the water, it appears that the boat got a hole in it and started to sink whilst it was tied up to the wharf. This appeared to be an exciting event in sleepy Akaroa as all the locals and tourists gathered around to see what was going on.
All in all I really enjoyed our time in Akaroa although I do think we should have stayed a night and gone swimming with the dolphins, done a jet boat ride and done some of the longer walks – if your pressed for time definitely try to make it to Akaroa for at least a few hours, grab some lunch have a quick stroll around carry on to your next destination…
Next up we may be lucky enough to get an entry about Christchurch…
Posted by mooloo on 08-03-2008 at 11:08 pm
Posted in Akaroa, Christchurch, New Zealand
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