Punting in the Park along Avon River

The first activity we had done was punting in the park. This was something which I wanted to do very much because I think this is very romantic and honeymoon couple should do it.

Our punting route was in Avon River (which goes through Christchurch city) in between Hagley Park and Botanical Gardens.

Our punter was Vincent (below) and he made interesting commentary as he punt and enterained us with his spanish songs.

We also get a chance to punt too! William gets to try it 1st.

Den I joined in. I had be asked by Vincent to sing a local song from Singapore. I thought for very long sang a malay song Burung Kaka Tua.

Making our bookings at i site

Although, we had prebooked our accomodation and some of popular activities online. We still had other stuff which we want to do.

New Zealand is a very tourist friendly place and they have visitor information centre called I-Site in almost every town! it is a 1 stop location to make your enquires, bookings and picking up brochures.

At Christchurch Airport

After about 10h for travelling, we arrived at Christchurch International Airport. New Zealand's time is faster than Singapore by 5 hours.

A customs doggie which was leashed by an officer came around stiff our belonging as we wait for our luggage at the conveyer belt.

New Zealand customs delarations is very strict especially on the biosecurity part such as no fresh food, outside soil are to be brought into the country. After making the declarations, we passed the customs smoothly.

Here I was at the arrival meeting point of the airport.

This was outside the airport.

A sign board on locations of transportation.

We had taken the airport shuttle! It is very convenient and stops right at our accomodation doorstep. However, we have to wait for enough people to get onto the bus before moving off.

Inside Terminal 3

We checked in quite early, plus an hour delay, we had a lot of time in Changi Airport. This is the first time that we are inside the departure hall of terminal 3.

Here are some of the facilites they had:

Handphone charging station

A special toilet for ladies

A lovely butterfly garden.

There also many shops in the departure hall. We were kept very busy, even though we had a very long wait to board our plane.

Shops inside T3

Our board gate is A4, Flight SQ 297 to Christchurch

Our journey begins! An overview.

Giving a brief introduction on the events happened in our New Zealand honeymoon trip.

These were places which we had covered at South island of New Zealand.

Christchurch
Canterbury Plains
Greymouth
Fox Glacier
Journey between Fox Glacier and Queenstown
Queenstown
Milford Sound
Lake Tekapo
Hanmer Springs



Commuting around South Island

We based at a town (starting with Christchurch) for few days, did some activities and proceed on to other town (ending at Christchurch). We did not do any self driving but had taken their coaches (Intercity) and train (Tranzalpine) to commute. The transportation can be pre-booked in internet.

The friendly bus drivers of intercity coaches would make commentary along the way (like a tour guide) and would have stops along the way for toilet, lunch or photo taking.

Tranzalpine is a popular scenic train journey of Canterbury Plains and Southern Alps plying between Christchurch and Greymouth.

This was how we went:

Christchurch → Fox Glacier → Queenstown → Christchurch

Flying to Christchurch

There were not many airlines going to Christchurch direct, however we took a direct flight from Singapore to Christchurch operated by Singapore Airlines.


Transport (To and fro Airport)

From Christchurch airport, there were a few modes of transport to get to the city (about 20 min from the airport). They were public bus, private airport shuttle bus, taxi and car rental. We had taken a shuttle bus costing us about NZD25 and they will take us to our accommodation doorstep. We find this is a good option for those who do not drive. The shuttle can also be arranged from our accommodation when going back.

Accommodation

We had the opportunity to stay in different kinds of accommodations (hostels, holiday park, motel and hotel)

Hostel have bunk bed with shared facilities like bathroom, kitchen, laundry, etc. There is also private room with ensuite bathrooms.
Holiday Park has similar accommodation facilities as hostel, with campervan grounds.
Motel is like a private apartment with ensuite bathroom, kitchen and bathroom facilities.

These were the places which we stay.

Hotel IBIS – Christchurch
Fox Glacier Holiday Park – Fox Glacier
The Lofts (Motel) – Queenstown
YMCA (Hostel) – Christchurch

Activities

Apart from going from places to places; exploring the towns and cities, we also did some activities and day tours.

Fox Trot at Fox Glacier: A half day trek at the glaciers passing through a temperate rainforest.
Milford Sound Cruise: Scenic coach jouney on the way to Milford sound. Midday scenic cruise at the fiord.
White water rafting at Shotover River: An exciting ride up along Skipper’s Canyon to our start point. A grade 3 to 5 river, rafting through the rapids with a 170m Oxen tunnel at the end of the course.
Quad bikes: Ride the 400CC ATV farm bikes up the Queenstown Hill which great scenic views of The Remarkables.
Sheep farm tour: Located near Woodend outside of Christchurch. Watch sheepdog chase sheep and sheep shearing demo.
Horse riding: 1 hour of horse riding along the banks of Waimakariri River and the river itself.
Hanmer Springs Day trip: A relaxing place surrounded by mountains consisting of BBQ lunch by the host, interesting commentary along the journey and entry to outdoor thermal pools.

Going down under.

Finally! Its coming! We are going for our honeymoon after many months of planning. I had named our trip as Fun, Exciting, Romantic and Scenic New Zealand Honeymoon!

Its a free and easy trip covering the south island only. Did quite lot of research from travel book like Lonely Planet and Rough Guides. Some of my colleagues also went before and I had consult them for advise. We bought our air tickets last april, also slowly got our acomomadation, transport and some of the activites booked. We had more or less know what we want to do and will go over to book other local tours and activities.

I had just completed our internet check in. Now busy packing our stuff. Can't wait to start our holiday!

Wedding banquet photos

Wedding Day Photos (Daytime)

Wedding photos collected.

We collected our actual day photos and video sometime back before chinese new year from our photographer and videographer Fotowerke. They had a done a good job in capturing our precious moments. Thanks to Celestine and Meng.

Will be posting some of the photos soon.

Appreciation to all the people who had involved!

Our wedding had been very successful! Its had not been possible with our family, friends and colleagues involvement.

Our family members and relatives who had been engaged and help a lot with our wedding customary events and preparation from the start to the actual day of our wedding.

Our main coordinator of the event, Daming had had been involved into every detail of our wedding from the itinery, songs to the running of the actual day. Everyone can see that you had managed the whole event very efficiently.

Our brothers Melvin, Jason and Wee Loon who had worked hard to crash the gate, helping to carry our things, ushering guests and many more.

Our sisters Lena, Karin, Xiao Yun and Peiru who had done many preparations for the gate crashing. All of you had fulfill your respective roles professionally. Thanks for making me carefree and beautiful on my wedding day.

Our chauffeur, Chris for driving us and my parents in his beautiful Audi A4.

Our emcees, Caroline and Jocelyn for making an enjoyable night for our guests.

Our receptionists Tiffany, Anna, Kelly, Meifang, Lena and Xiao Yun for helping to direct our guest to their respective seat.

Thank you to all of you!

End of our Furama Riverfront stay

It was our last day at Furama Riverfront which also meant that our mini honeymoon had come to the end. I looked out from our suite window and had taken the last look of the view. Apart from our wedding day, it had been a relaxing time for us. We enjoyed our stay.

In overall, we had not not regretted choosing Furama Riverfront as our wedding banquet venue. We felt very welcomed and our banquet manager Jason was very detail and professional. Thing went quite smoothly that day. We also received some feedback from our guest. Food was fantastic. However the serving and topping up of drinks was infreguent.

Also special thanks to our coordinator Albert Liew who had made the neccesary arrangements to make our wedding dinner happen smoothly.

The day after our big day

We slept till 11am today. We will only be checking out tomorrow because we had converted our anniversary stay to our 2nd night stay. Therefore there is no rush to pack our belongings.

After washing up and initial counting of our ang pows, we went to the the Square to have our buffet lunch. So glad that they have salmon sashimi! my fav!

I went to had my complimentary head and shoulder massage at the hotel's SPA after that, then went back to our suite to count Ang Pows. We took really long (about rest of the afternoon) to count how much we received. All the ang pow will be settled as our banquet bill.

In the evening, we returned our gown and suit, deposited some money and had dinner. Although its was a full busy day, its very relaxing for us.

Edna's colleagues attending our Wedding banquet @ Furama Riverfront

These photos are taken my colleague, Caroline who is also my emcee that night. These are some pictures of my GSK colleagues who had attended my wedding.

Wedding day photos using my camera.

Its our big day today! Just completed our daytime activites. These are some of the photos taken using my camera. Thanks to Lena aka my pa to helping to take the pics of the actual day.

1 day before our wedding: Relatives, manicure, pedicure and wrist corsages

Its the last day before my actual day wedding! My uncle's family from Malaysia had arrived and they will be staying over at our home. Appreciated that they came all the way from Ipoh to attend my wedding.

My mom and I went for mani and pedi at Fingerworks and then went over to my Floral School to collect some flowers for making wrist corsages for my Jie Meis and our mothers.

This is how my Jie Meis' corsages look like. All done by me!

2 days before our weddng - An Chuan and collection of gown

Its time to do An Chuan, a chinese wedding tradtion at which a bridal bed is set up. We did a simple an chuan by ourselves. Putting new bedsheets, shifting bed to position, putting yuan into the wardrobe, placing an chuan stuff like peanuts, red dates, lotus seeds, 2 oranges 2 money bags consisting $9.90 and $8.80 worth of coins.

This symbolises the good health, fortune and the off-springs for the wedding couple.

Me trying to put the quilt cover in place.

After we completed our An Chuan, we proceeded our bridal studio Yvonne Creative to collect our gowns.

3 days before my wedding: Meeting up at Furama Riverfront

The main programme for the day is to meet up with our coordinator, Albert Liew for our wedding banquet at Furama Riverfront to finalise our contract and to test our media to be played during our wedding banquet.

Albert went through the contract with us with many many details which made us feel at ease that many things had been arranged. Our wedding coordinator who is William's friend Daming came too and we went through with the AV specialist to test our photo montage and music.

In 3 days time, it will be the actual thing! Hope that every thing would go well!

4 days before my wedding, a super packed day and a surprise mini hen's party

It was a super busy day for me today.

• Dental appointment,


• trip to hair salon to get my hair trimmed and treatment done,


• collect my photo montage at academy video


• do some shopping for my wedding related stuff


• meeting up with my jie meis for a final briefing

For the JieMeis meet up was not just a Jie Mei's meeting up but also my mini Hen's Party @ Esplanade for me.

It was a surprise for me and I did not expect this. We had dinner at Thai express instead of food court. Wanted to arrange dinner at food court at 1st because I knew one of my Jie Mei's was recovering from stomach flu and there would have more choices for her. Luckily there is suitable food for her at Thai Express.

So my hen's party started at Thai express looking like this.

This is my Jie Mei who had put on all these for me and I was supposed to wear it throughout my Hen's Party. There a were a few challenges which I had to complete. One was which was truth or dare. They asked me a few questions which I had to answer, making annoucement at the crowd, collecting kisses from the public, doing sexy poses in front of public and telling a secret to a waiter. I think i would never dare to do all these tasks all my life and I had done them tonight!

See my achivements!

Although I was a bit horrified at 1st by what I'm supposed to do, I had super lots of fun and these will leave a great memory with me. My appreciation goes all out to my dear Jie Meis: Karin, Lena, Xiao Yun and Pei Ru. Thank you for your efforts for making this Mini Hen's night possible!

My last day of work before my wedding

It was last day of my work before my wedding today. I am very busy at work as usual, completing my last user test experiment before I go on leave. I will be back next Wednesday.

Picture from the Chicks Party

As promised, these are some of photos taken during our Chicks party!

The Chicks

Starting BBQ

The BBQers


Taking pics together

Rehearsal for the emcees

Playing with sparklers, well wishes and saboing

The drinkers