Tuesday, February 19 - Sharks, and Christchurch

We camped near the mouth of the Waitaki River.  The beach there on the
Pacific Ocean is very popular with surf fishermen.

The long, wide beach is made up entirely of flattish limestone rocks ...

... and they're none too comfortable to walk on.

This little shark was washed up on the beach

I won't be sad if he's the largest we see while in NZ.  Especially when we
go sea kayaking.

We got to Christchurch in the evening.  The city
recently had two major earthquakes , one on September 4,
2010, that did a lot of damage, but resulted in no fatalities...

... and the second on February 22, 2011, which resulted in 185 deaths.  It was a
huge catastrophe for a small city in a small country.

A 25 block area of the center of town has been fenced off, and over 1600
buildings will eventually be torn down, including almost every one over
five stories tall.  Looking through the chain link fence at the trash blowing
lazily through the deserted streets was like seeing into
a post-apocalyptic future.

Signs advertising sales, flyers of upcoming events,  all the immediate paraphenalia
of a living city remain.  But weeds grow in the cracks of the sidewalks ..

... and evidence of vandalism haunt the closed city.

A small area of the downtown is called 'Re-Start', and cleverly uses shipping
containers for a well-designed neighborhood of shops, restaurants, and
businesses.  But the city has a tremendously long way to go for complete
recovery.  There are many competing visions on how that should be
accomplished, as can be expected.  It will be very interesting to watch
what happens there over the next couple decades.

As I blogged a few days ago, that night we ate at a restaurant to say goodbye
to Kelly and Dan

This was my favorite.  Only Mike McCabe could brew a better beer.