Amy & Rachel's Getaway to the South Island -Day 1

Luckily there wasn't much fog at 6:50 am Monday morning, so our flight down to Christchurch got out easily. We picked up our bags and headed straight for a taxi to bring us to the train station (our flight got in at 7:40 and our train left at 8:15 - we arrived at the train station at 8:03). Our train trip, called the TranzAlpine, was amazing - tons of rolling hills and mountains, river gorges, and valleys (and of course the requisite hundreds of cows, sheep, and horses seen everywhere in NZ). The train goes from Christchurch on the east coast to Greymouth on the west coast. On Monday we took it half-way to a tiny little town called Arthur's Pass. It is a beautiful little place truly in the middle of nowhere, or rather, in the middle of a couple of huge mountains. The funny story here was that when we got off the train our bags were the only ones taken off (all of the other people were staying on the train to Greymouth). We asked the baggage guy how to get to the Middle South Hotel, where we were staying. He was very friendly, and before telling us where our hotel was, he first told us that there had been a storm the night before which made there be no power in the area and no hot water (I figured he had to be joking). He then pointed off into the distance a bit, explaining that over on the other side of the train tracks, through the tall grass were two (somewhat dilapitated) buildings - the blue one being the tourist office and the red one being the Middle South Hotel (this I believed as I could see nothing else around). So we both solemnly asked how we got over there, at which point he laughed and pointed in the other direction stating that there was a pedestrian walkway down to the main street of town where we would find the real tourist office, hotel, and even a couple of little restaurants and a convenience store - apparently this was a little display for us of kiwi humor. We were laughing so hard thinking about how gullible we had been ( I still swear that I never did believe the bit about the no power or hot water though Amy admits that she did). Luckily he took us for stupid Canadians instead of stupid Americans; however, he only thought so because we were friendly.
Despite our shaky start in Arthur's Pass, we had a great stay there. Monday afternoon we went on a very rigorous hike basically going straight up for an hour - ending in wonderful views of the whole area, and then back down. With so much time on our hands out in the wilderness we got into some great conversations...

Our hotel was fine, dinner okay (a bit of an issue with Amy ordering the fish and chips and them bringing out the fish of the day for her, and the waitress trying to blame Amy because she didn't want to get in trouble for serving F & C in the restaurant area instead of the bar area - mind you, they are mere steps apart), and the two of us began our three night tradition of sharing a bottle of wine (and possibly a before or after dinner drink) to fully get into the kiwi relaxation mode. On Tuesday morning we had breakfast and went on a much shorter and tamer hike (the other was actually defined as a "tramp" on the walking paths map). This one led to a beautiful waterfall, where the water looked like it was truly "falling" off of the rocks. We then got back on the train around 11 am and headed out to Greymouth.