chrischarly


700 Blog Entries
6 Trips
5148 Photos
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Trips: Chris and Charly's Passage through SE Asia Chris and Charly Down Under Chris and Charly's African Adventure Chris and Charly's Pacific Island Pit-Stop Chris and Charly's mini trip to The States Chris and Charly's Indian Odyssey Shorthand link: http://blogabond.com/chrischarly

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Looking for wheels

Frankton, New Zealand

Had a look at quite a few vans and cars today, all of them over-priced for what they are and many things wrong with them which Chris could tell by having a look. Busy day but I suppose it is just our first day of looking for vehicles. Just hoped it would be as easy as it was in Oz.

written by

chrischarly on January 2, 2012 from Frankton, New Zealand

from the travel blog: Chris and Charly Down Under

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Happy New Year!

Frankton, New Zealand

Justine enjoying the sunshine

Happy New Year!! With Christmas and New Year out of the way, we are now on a search for a new van! So the first thing we did was to get a lift into town and take back and replace the broken portable internet stick we brought yesterday with another one twice the price that also didn’t work. So after about 5 hours of Chris playing with it, he fixed it, this time himself. We then spent the evening searching for cars and vans, loads available but most of them pretty rubbish.

written by

chrischarly on January 1, 2012 from Frankton, New Zealand

from the travel blog: Chris and Charly Down Under

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End of the year

Frankton, New Zealand

Sunset in Frankton

The last day in 2011. Been a fantastic year, been to and seen a load of amazing places and collected some unforgettable memories. We didn’t do a lot today. Justine had plans with a few of her friends and as New Year’s isn’t exactly that special to us; just another day, we stayed in and had a few drinks together as we don’t spend enough time together as it is!

written by

chrischarly on December 31, 2011 from Frankton, New Zealand

from the travel blog: Chris and Charly Down Under

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Recovering.... AGAIN

Frankton, New Zealand

Awesome views from a lookout point

After a fantastic night’s sleep, Chris and I woke up massively hung-over at 1pm and woke Justine as she was supposed to be going to a hotel with a friend. She eventually got up at 2pm and left at 4 a few hours later than planned and we spent a relaxing day chilling out watching films.

written by

chrischarly on December 30, 2011 from Frankton, New Zealand

from the travel blog: Chris and Charly Down Under

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Another night binge drinking...

Frankton, New Zealand

Justine

Woke up, too windy again for the course so we cleared and packed up headed back to Queenstown picking up an Italian friend of Justine’s along the way. When we got back we dropped off Justine and headed into town to pick up Tracy,

Drinking cocktails...

another friend, brought a load of drinks including 2 bottles of vodka and spent the afternoon and night consuming way too much for 5 people, including sending Mason, Justine’s son into town to buy 2 more bottles of vodka. Lots of yummy cocktails were consumed and all in all a pretty messy night. No idea what time we went to bed.

written by

chrischarly on December 29, 2011 from Frankton, New Zealand

from the travel blog: Chris and Charly Down Under

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Paragliding and 4 wheel driving

Wanaka, New Zealand

Practicing paragliding

So pretty

Got up at 7ish and quickly packed up what we needed for the day before heading to the lake with the guys.

Our cars at the bottom across lake!

Waterfall in the mountains

Crossing a river

On the 4X4 trip

Views from Justine's car

Off-roading

Having a quick break

Awesome

Unfortunately it was too windy for the course so it was aborted after a few hours of waiting. We then decided to go on a 4WD tour around the lake which was amazing and the views epic.

So gorgeous!!

Sunset

We then headed back to camp; Chris and Dean went fishing whilst we went to town to get some more beer and food and had a chilled night. Good job we bought Salmon as Chris and Dean were rubbish at fishing!!

written by

chrischarly on December 28, 2011 from Wanaka, New Zealand

from the travel blog: Chris and Charly Down Under

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Camping again

Albert Town, New Zealand

Me and Justine relaxing

Off-roading

We packed up the car and headed to Albert Town which is near Wanaka to camp. It was an amazing drive through the mountains and the views were even better than we had seen so far.

BBQ

Chris setting up the tent

Sunset

Found a nice spot and Chris setup the tent while we supervised and drank some wine. Later on, some of Justine’s paragliding crew turned up. They were running a course for two guys the next day at Lake Hawae. We cooked some tandoori Chicken and drunk more wine, then headed to bed as we had to get up at 7am to go support the paragliding course.

written by

chrischarly on December 27, 2011 from Albert Town, New Zealand

from the travel blog: Chris and Charly Down Under

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A little explore around town

Queenstown, New Zealand

Although pretty hungover, we manged to get our act together and went for a nice tour around Queenstown with Mason, Justine’s son, which took in some of the nice parts of the lake and the town. We then went shopping for a few bits before headed back to base for a chilled evening.

written by

chrischarly on December 26, 2011 from Queenstown, New Zealand

from the travel blog: Chris and Charly Down Under

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Merry Christmas!! :)

Frankton, New Zealand

A guy trapped in the sofa

Planking

Outside Justine's place

Mason breaking into the site opposite

Another manakin we dressed up and laid next to Justine whilst she slept!!

Got up and Chris got to work on food prep. Some early birds rocked up and we started on the cocktails early before a BBQ breakfast to ensure we could last the day. The whole day was a mix of drinking, chatting eating and having fun. Chris’s food went down really well and we all had a great time. Justine was clearly out of practice and ended up crashing about 5pm but did re-emerge later in the evening. Happy Christmas everyone…

written by

chrischarly on December 25, 2011 from Frankton, New Zealand

from the travel blog: Chris and Charly Down Under

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Christmas Eve

Frankton, New Zealand

Manakin modelling Justine's cast

Manakin we dressed up

Barbie zip-lining

Hung out at Justine’s and helped her organise the place for Christmas. It pretty much entailed a bit of tidying, lots of dressing the place up with some funky arty stuff, all mixed in with plenty of breaks in the sunshine. Chris then deboned the turkey which he was very pleased about and we had a nice chilled Christmas Eve.