First week - Bangkok, Auckland and Christchurch

What a week! We flew overnight on Monday to Bangkok, the capital of Thailand. We stayed for two nights in an amazing modern hotel in a room on the 35th floor with fantastic views over the city. We had a day of site-seeing, visiting the Wat Pho temple to see the giant golden reclining Buddha statue and the beautiful old wooden buildings and gardens at Jim Thompson's house. It is obvious that Thailand is a rapidly developing country with many new skyscrapers being built, huge shopping malls and a modern Skytrain transport system. However, there were glimpses of the poverty some Thais still live in.
We then had another 11 hour flight to New Zealand and stayed for one night in Auckland on the North Island before catching yet another flight to Christchurch, the largest city on the South Island. This beautiful city was devastated by two earthquakes in 2010 and 2011 which killed 185 people. It is very eerie and sad, seeing a once beautiful and bustling city centre, which was full of tourists when I visited in 2002, reduced to dust, empty boarded up buildings and rubble. Three years on from the earthquake people here are trying to rebuild their city and there are examples of this in the temporary shopping centre made of shipping containers and the new cathedral made a giant cardboard tubes.
Yesterday we travelled to the Banks Peninsular which used to be a separate island formed by an ancient extinct volcano, but is now linked to the mainland. The crater of the volcano is now open to the sea, forming a large sheltered harbour in which the pretty town of Akoroa sits. The weather was hot and sunny so we enjoyed sitting on the harbour eating fish and chips, watching the boats come in from their whale and dolphin watching trips.

Tomorrow we hire a car and head off for a tour around the South Island. Wish us luck!