Tom and Margot's Adventures in Photography: Last Day in New Zealand

We spent our last day in Christchurch. We had a pleasant surprise we we checked in. Somehow we were upgraded to a suite. The Merivale Manor consists of a old house and then several newer motel structures. We were in the first floor of the original house.

This is the entryway. Two bedrooms on the right and a sitting area, dining room and kitchen on the left.

This is the dining, kitchen, sitting area.

This is the front bedroom. We actually used the back bedroom.

We wandered around downtown Christchurch for a few hours before heading to the airport.

This is a small park along the river.

Anyone know what this is? I thought the fruit/nut was interesting.

As you may recall Christchurch was hit with a couple of major earthquakes a couple of years ago. It has had a huge impact on downtown Christchurch.

This old building has been partly demolished. I don't know what they are going to do with the rest of it.

Large building being dismantled in Christchurch New Zealand

The first quake was on Sept 4, 2010 and measured 7.1 but was about 24 miles away. There was another big quake on Feb 22, 2011 that measured 6.3 but was directly under Christchurch. There was a 5.8 aftershock 13 minutes later.

This building was so badly damaged it is being torn down.

This building, a church I believe, is braced up. I suppose it will be restored at some point.

The death toll was 185 in the second quake including 115 killed in one building collapse.

Damaged cathedral in Christchurch, New Zealand

This is the main Anglican Cathedral in downtown Christchurch. It isn't clear to me if they plan to repair it or not. I gather they are doing engineering studies to determine if the land is stable enough.

Shipping containers being used to support a building in Christchurch

Here they have stacked up containers to form a structure for support of this building.

Container mall in Christchurch with Chinese decorations

I thought this was an interesting concept - they have built what they call a container mall. This is a shopping and dining area built out of shipping containers.

Notice the decorations for Chinese New Year. Tourists from China are very important to the NZ economy.

Here is another look at part of the mall.

Much of the downtown area is still blocked off and merchants have moved here temporarily.

A display at the International Antarctic Centre in Christchurch

We stopped by the International Antarctic Centre in the afternoon. It is located right at the airport so it was very convenient. It covers the history of the exploration of Antarctica and the ecological and development challenges ahead. It is really quite interesting. It very interesting for kids but with enough technical and science stuff to keep me interested.

Little Blue Penguin at the International Antarctic Centre in New Zealand

They have a penguin habitat there. These are Little Blue Penguins from New Zealand that have been rescued for one reason or another. Some are blind, some have deformed beaks and some are partially paralyzed.