Today (Friday) is my last full day in New Zealand and the weather has turned grey with the risk of rain...so perhaps not as hard to leave had it been gloriously sunny as it has been a lot of the time I have been here.
My talk to Christchurch Tramping Club went ok. It was a small audience of about 12 but I was told that was because the Alpine Club were having a book launch last night so I guess that isn't too bad as competition for my talk! The club is the first I have come across that has its own Training Officer - who happens to be from Derbyshire - and they run courses in river crossings, navigation, winter skills etc. They plan their walks slightly differently from the OFTC that I met the other day in that CTC have one person in the club who is responsible for ALL contact with landowners for access permission (OFTC leave that to the individual tramp leaders to do so), so it is interesting to see how different clubs approach things in different ways. We had a good discussion on the insurance aspects and on UK Ordnance Survey maps and NZ Topo maps. I reckon about half the audience were actually Brits so I didn't need to do the hard sell on walking in the UK this time!!
Today, I return my hire car and start to think about packing. I am out for a meal with the family tonight in town to say Goodbye and Merry Christmas etc and can't believe 5 weeks have passed already. I have to re-read my own blog to see where I have been and what I have done.
Watch this space for a round up posting when I get back to snowy UK!!!
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