Christchurch

February 5
Christchurch

For my first visit to Christchurch I did the usual: find something big to climb and see how high I can get.
Technically I was in the port town that leads into Chirstchurch, named Lyttleton, and that’s where I did my climbing. I started out by making my way up to some small castle that had originally been used for navigation and signaling approaching ships. After a quick look around there, I continued walking through the neighborhood in any direction that headed up.
The road soon stopped and turned into an overgrown dirt road. It’s at this point that I start getting nervous because while I’m walking through the weeds and grasses, all I can think about are the possibilities for snakes and spiders I have absolutely no knowledge of. Meanwhile, the further I travel down the path, the more overgrown it gets till it diminishes to what is barely even a foot path through high grasses scattered with strange spider webs I’ve never seen, but I push on with growing trepidation. Soon I’m walking through a field surrounded by these strange webs knit around single reeds and trying to negotiate a trail that maybe gets used a few times per season. But I can see an out cropping of rocks at the top of the trail, something that usually means a gorgeous view, and that was all the encouragement I needed to risk my life for the sake of the hike.
Thankfully I was right and the outcropping was a ridge with unobstructed views, and breathtaking views at that. I walked for a ways along this ridge, always trying to get higher, still seeing a slight resemblance of the trail I originally pursued up there. I climbed higher, the views got better, and the trail eventually tapered off into nothing and I was left about as high as I was willing to travel. Not being too eager to climb through dense foliage or up rock faces alone, I turned around and made my decent. In the meantime, I’m enjoying myself taking pictures and videos, making a mockery of The Lord of the Ring (which was filmed in New Zealand) with ridiculous narrations and camera angles.
The decent down the rocks and through the fields was met with less anxiety simply because I had no other choice but to get off my mountain, and soon I was back on paved roads without a trace of spider bites. The next goal was to travel a similarly underappreciated trail that I had picked out from my previous vantage point. I was quickly running out of time though, and due to some port restrictions, I cut my next quest short to allow ample time to get back to the ship. Maybe next time I’ll get my chance, with the only thing standing in my way being an opportunity to skydive! But we’ll see what happens, thanks for reading!