Another Christchurch 'must see' is the Antarctic Centre. Sort of a cross between a zoo, theme park and museum, it's good fun if a little pricey! Above is Mum in the 'antarctic simulator' - a room held at -8 degrees which then uses a fan to blow you about a bit so you can pretend you're in an antarctic (summer) storm. It's quite a relief to come back out again!
The real high-light though are the Little Blue penguins. They're all 'special needs' penguins that can't be released back into the wild...
This one is blind and needs hand-feeding
And this one only has one good flipper and swims lopsidedly in circles!
These guys are relaxing back in their 'private' nest.
The other part of the experience is a Hagglund Ride - a suprisingly impressive vehicle used to get about on the ice. This Russian video shows some of it's more extreme capabilities, including steep inclines, uneven terrain, crossing crevaces and even crossing lakes - it's fully amphibious!
Looks innocent enough inside.
But when it gets going it can really move! If the ground looks rather wet in these pictures, that's because part of the military-grade obstacle course involves crossing a deep lake, so the whole thing gets submerged to just below the windows and it 'swims' along on its tracks. Meanwhile everyone inside is praying that their door-seal holds!
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