Friday, January 04, 2008

Day 101 Blenheim

Backpacker to downtown and back
Time: short
Distance: shorter
Avg Speed: urban assault speed
Terrain: full on traffic

We headed into town to run some errands this afternoon. We had them to do in Christchurch when we returned there, but we had time so we set out. We are in the market for lighter sleeping bags for Australia and Southeast Asia. That item on the list was a total bust, but our second item was a score that exceeded our expectations. We had been looking for a guide book for Southeast Asia which included Thailand. The third bookstore we went into had a Lonely Planet for Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam and the Greater Mekong Region. The greater Mekong includes northern Thailand and the Yunnan Province in China. It was quite a score and what excited Leslie even more was the fact it was published in September. Exciting stuff.
We are now in the process of memorizing it.
I also wanted to talk a little bit about things that make you go hmmm. The first was little tidbit on the news about a study that showed that airlines put even more pollution into the air than previously thought. It is a little disheartening to hear the study, but the part that made you go hmmm, was the reaction from the green party here in New Zealand. The green party is a political party in the government here. They would like to see a cap on incoming flights from far away destinations like North America and Europe. I would like to remind the readers out there that one of the top four industries in New Zealand is tourism. This is a little like cutting off your nose to spite your face. A fellow backpacker from Estonia that was watching the news with us just laughed and wondered how they would get by with no German tourists here. Evidently he has ran into quite a few Germans. I might also add that most of our fellow backpackers, who are not kiwis, work locally at the vineyards. Goodbye fruit pickers. The second item that made you go hmmm was a meal of chicken roll wraps with a $30 bottle of sauvignon blanc. The wine was 3 times more than the meal of leftover tortillas, carrot salad and chicken roll (picture a high end chicken spam). I think that meal was more of an excuse to drink a bottle of really good wine and not look like a total lush. We enjoyed the tortillas to the last crumb and the wine to the last drop! If you are looking for a good sauvignon blanc I would suggest Cloudy Bay or Nautilus from the Marlborough region here.
CK

1 comment:

JennSean said...

Carrot salad...yummy,yummy. Duly noted on the wine, will see what I can find around here. Need to stay up with the Kehmeiers. -JH

Ps, love the urban assault speed description!