Our holiday - stop 3 - Queenstown

Oh my word - how busy have we been? We arrived in town and realised that we didn't have an accurate address for the bach we were renting - cruising up and down the road didn't ring any bells and we eventually gave up, left messages with the owner and headed into town. Come 6pm still no reply so the 'I shop' helped us out and we google-earthed until we narrowed it down to a couple of properties. Luckily the key was under the mat and we got in!
The Bach had amazing views across Lake Wakatipu towards Queenstown and we woke up to our first adventure filled day. We headed up the skyline Gondola and took in the stunning scenery before indulging Joe the adrenalin junkie and taking the ski lift higher up to ride the Luge (a few times) we all (including Ben) loved it, but Joe was thrilled!


After lunch we headed to the birdlife park at the base of the hill for close encounters with Kiwi, Kakariki (native green parrots), Tuatara and even some NZ pests (rats and possum).

Our last day in Queenstown started with a nice sedate cruise on Lake Wakatipu on an old steam ship the TSS Earnslaw- built in 1919.


We extended the trip to take in the Walters Peak High Country Farm. Here we saw sheep dogs at work, how to shear a sheep in 41 strokes - the theory anyway. The guy below, whilst very skilled, took about 5 or so minutes to shear this one - some way short of the world record of 30 odd seconds.
The kids also got to feed some of the animals on the farm which they really enjoyed.

It was a nice hot day so required the obligatory paddle in the lake until the boat came back to pick us up. As usual, Matt got significantly wetter than he'd intended, courtesy of Joe and Ben!

We rounded off the day with an adrenalin filled jet boat ride on the Shotover river through Skippers canyon. The journey to Skippers Canyon was over some rough, hilly steep sided terrain with no safety barriers - in a bus with a driver who was a genuine lunatic! Still, we saw a few of the Lord of The Rings film locations.

The jet boat we went in was very fast (40+mph) and travel in just 10cm of water going very close to the river edges The driver threw in plenty of 360 degree spins - below. Joe loved it, Ben was not so keen.


Everyone still managed a smile after the event though. Some were happier to be on dry land than others. When asked what he thought, Ben said 'it was fun, I liked it fast'. When asked if he would like to do it again? An Emphatic 'NO!'

Next stop some less adrenalin filled activities, but hopefully some stunning scenery! Love to all!