Our first country is New Zealand!

We left Lynchburg on Wednesday and arrived in Christchurch on Friday afternoon.

We kept up as long as possible to ease the jet lag and were lucky that there was an international youth rugby tournament happening a block from our hotel.

On Saturday we picked up the RV we rented for our 3 week camper van road trip around the South Island. We have never stayed in an RV, much less driven one, so add driving on the left-hand side of the road in an unfamiliar country and there was no small amount of nerves when Tom pulled out of the parking lot. But other than hanging a little to the left while driving to our first stop, it went fine. 

Better than fine, the drive was incredible! Flat farmland, followed by rolling green hills dotted with sheep and baby lambs jumping and bumping each other.

The landscape grew more dramatic, with hills rising to cliffs, then pine forests, then opening to wind swept expanses and distant mountains until suddenly when rounding a bend there before us appeared a vivid blue, a true aqua lake flanked from behind with a snow-capped mountain range. We had arrived at our first stop: Lake Tekapo. 

We would be here for two nights. We spent our first night on living logistics: grocery shopping, figuring out the RV and unpacking.