Post Nuptials

Hey, everyone, it is me, Jen, so expect future entries to be less witty. They will also be shorter and less frequent since tomorrow a.m. we leave the conveniences of the city and may not have regular internet access. Plus, we are doing a lot of scheduled activities which may leave us a bit short on "blog-time".

Since we last posted, we spent most of Tuesday sleeping and recovering, but also went to the International Antarctic Center where we saw handicapped Little Blue Penguins and got to ride around in a Haggland (an all-terrain, amphibian Antarctic vehicle) driven by a crazy man named Shaun. We had dinner at a neat place called the Tap Room where Scott had green-lipped mussels and really good Monteith's beer, and I had kangaroo and a Kiwi daiquiri. We walked around a lot after that looking for the Christchurch casino which sadly had no poker on Tuesdays. I still walked away $5.00NZ richer though from some boring slots.

Wednesday: We went on an all day tour to where they filmed Edoras, Rohan for the Lord of the Rings, the Two Towers. Now, I know that most of you are now scratching your heads a bit because I told you all that that was where we were getting married. I lied. Or rather, I was under some false presumptions. Anyway, it matters not at all. Point is, we went there.

As I said, we leave tomorrow for Dunedin, which is south of Christchurch along the east coast of NZ. On the way, we will stop at Omauru to see some normal Little Blue Penguins on a behind the scenes tour.

Here are some more wedding pictures and some pictures from the last 2 days.

At Edoras:




At the International Antarctic Center:


In Christchurch:
More wedding photos:

We Done Got Hitched!

The day started when the air-raid siren that is our room alarm clock went off at 0500 stopping both Jen and my hearts. After a quick use of the defibrillator, Jen started getting ready and I went back to sleep.

We had breakfast at the hotel restaurant. Jen had French toast and I had the Warners Classic Grill. The Kiwi interpretation of French Toast, by the way, involves piling Canadian bacon and fried bananas on top of the toast. An odd combo, but it sorta worked.

After breakfast, our wedding coordinator, Donna, and her crazy Japanese husband/business partner, Shoei, picked us up to go the the Office of Internal Affairs to get the legal bits out of the way. There, Donna annoyed the nice bureaucrat by committing heinous crimes against spelling on the wedding application. Jen and I had to swear that we were not related in any way (they had a list of several dozen relationships that were forbidden to marry). That done, we headed back to the hotel and Donna made Jen promise to eat (something that, apparently, many brides forget to do).

We had about an hour and a half before the hair and makeup person was going to show up, so we walked around Christchurch for a bit to run some errands and find a bite. We found a bite at a small cafe whose name is escaping both of us at the moment. We both had a "Toasty", which is a fancy way of saying "grilled sammich". Jen had mushrooms and ham, I had chicken and tomatoes. Jen's sarsasparilla beer was way better than my organic apple-black current juice.

The makeup person, Julie-Anne, showed up on time and I (Scott) was banished to the hotel lounge with a book.

Hours passed.

I returned to the room in time to catch the end of Jen's hair and makeup application and for both of us to start getting dressed. Everyone loved both of our costumes, especially Jen's dress. As we exited the hotel to get into the Rolls Royce that was taking us to the heliport, we got a lot of stares from a group of tourists who were boarding a bus right outside the hotel.

The helicopter ride took us to the wedding location: the confluence of the Waimakariri and Esk Rivers in the Southern Alps. It was very windy and we startled a rabbit upon landing. The helicopters landed on a ridge above the rocky riverbed. We hiked up about 100 yards into a field of wild grass and thorny berry bushes that loved Jen's dress and shawl.

And then there was some drama with Jen's belt, the ceremony, some coffee mugs, an exchange of rings, some pictures, some bubbly, some paper work to sign, and we were off again back to the heliport.

The scenery both to and from the location was absolutely breathtaking.

After we returned, we quickly changed into our fancy, shmancy dinner clothes and went to a marvelous dinner at the Curator's House, which was highly recommended by the hotel staff, but not in any of the tour books (which we took to be a very good sign). When the concierge made the booking, apparently they let slip that we were newly weds, so we had a private room on the second floor with wee confetti spelling out "Congratulations" all over the table. I had a porterhouse steak with portabella mushrooms topped with some sort of salsa. Jen had cold marinated venison and a side order of olives. We split a divine Crema Catalana, which is a cinnamon and lemon flavored creme brulee.

And then we walked home and collapsed.

Here is an official wedding picture for your viewing enjoyment. We'll post some that we have taken once we buy a cord that will let us download the pictures from the camera, as I was stupid and did not pack it.

Christchurch

We are all checked in and settled into our hotel here in Christchurch. We are staying at the Warners Historic Hotel, which is some sort of historic hotel with internet access, but no central heat (each room has a wall-mounted heater unit). The rooms have old-school metal keys (as opposed to a key card) that are attached to a big chunk of wood (3" x 2"). While that does make it rather hard to loose the key, it is a little awkward to have in one's pocket. As honeymooners, the hotel upgraded our room on the house, which we thought was very kind of them.

We took a walk earlier in the day, looking for a place to have lunch. It turns out, however, that almost all of the restaurants in Christchurch are closed for lunch on Sunday. Bah. We ended up eating in the hotel restaurant. Jen had a lamb salad, I had bruschetta.

The walk was fruitful, however, in that we got to experience a kiwi cuckoo clock chiming the hour. It was an enormous egg-shaped clock with a kiwi sitting on top. When it was time to do its thing, the side of the egg opened up and there were several scenes played out about different phases of New Zealand history. Without a narrator, it was more or less nonsensical. There was a bit with a sheep getting shorn and sporting a poodle show cut, something about rugby, a random bungee jumper, and it closed with an alien riding a hover bike. We really don't know what the last part was supposed to be, but I'll see if I can trade in the Toyota Carola that we are renting for one of those hover bikes.

We had dinner at the Tandori Palace, an Indian restaurant next door to the hotel. Jen had a basket of nan (the way tasty Indian flat bread) as big as her head (I am, for once, not exaggerating when I use that idiom) and I had a chicken curry. All the food was excellent. Jen had a glass of the ginger beer, which was very good, and I had a local beer: the Monteiths Dark. I'm not quite sure where it falls in the beer taxonomy, perhaps a dark lager? Regardless, it gets two thumbs up: Smooth, complex flavor with a hint of spice and almost no aftertaste. The evening was made, however, by the Crazy Mongolian (complete with fur-lined hat) who peered into the window next to our table and started talking. We are not sure if he was trying to talk to us or was content to converse with the voices in his head.

Tomorrow is the big day. Jen is getting up at 5 to start prepping ... I will be getting up significantly later, as I am a guy and thus relatively low maintenance.