Christchurch, what a name! Boring transit day today. We had to set alarms for 6AM to be on the way to the airport at 7. We returned the rental car. Our first flight was to Melbourne and uneventful.

We had a tiny bit of stress getting to our second flight because we bought two separate tickets and had to navigate from one terminal to the other. We checked in and got through on time and took off for Christchurch. As always, I alternated between sleeping and looking out of the window. For most of the time we were over the ocean and then I woke and looked out to this. Hello New Zealand!

This became farm lands and then we landed in scenic Christchurch.

The plane took forever to get to a gate and then we got our rental car. We did the same thing we’ve done in other rental cars recently: drove straight to Kmart to buy a booster seat and a cooler. We will be able to return these but even if we couldn’t, it saves us money on car seat rentals and eating out. After Kmart we stocked up on groceries at Woolies.

It is Autumn here and really feels like Autumn. The trees are changing colors and there’s a nip in the air. Our bodies feel so discombobulated by the shift in seasons. This is our third autumn this year.

We checked into our Airbnb and I made fish tacos. I could write a cookbook of “simple dinners to make in Airbnbs” where you don’t need much equipment or ingredients that you’ll just use one spoonful of.

There’s a two hour time difference here so Millie didn’t go to bed until 10. Even though it’s 8 according to her body clock, it felt like we were breaking some rules playing cards until 10.