Day Two: Lake Ohau

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Day 2 on Contiki was not too bad. After a subpar breakfast we loaded up on the bus and headed out to Lake Ohau. We took stops every couple of hours at places and so the drive itself wasn't too bad. One of the stops was at a glacier fed lake. I forgot the name but I think one of them was something like Lake Pekaku. It was pretty amazing. The water was like this pastel blue with the snow tipped mountains in the backdrop. I had never seen water the color of that lake, which was pretty cool. We stopped at a couple lakes before we stopped for the night at Lake Ohau.

On the drive we were told about the optional activities for the southern NZ island, and I think I almost checked everything. Over the next 4 to 5 days I will be:
1. Doing a daytrip to Milford Sound (supposedly one of the most amazingly beautiful places in the world)
2. Doing a canyon swing (bunjy jump into a swing in a canyon)
3. Doing 2 bunjy jump, one that will dunk you in the water, and the second which is the highest here in NZ
4. Doing the highest Bunjy swing in the world
5. Doing a helicopter ride to the top of a glacier and then hiking on the glacier
Pretty much some crazy things.

Once at the lodge the view was spectacular and we spent the rest of the evening there knocking back a few, shooting some pool, and playing darts. All in all a pretty relaxed night. One thing I noticed which may not be a good thing for me is that a good portion of the tour is coupled up. A lot of couples have come on the trip and then there is a group of Koreans that don't speak too much English. So it does bring the number of single partiers down quite a bit. I was talking to the bartender at the Lodge who gets Contiki tours going through there 3 times a week, but he said usually people coming through on the 2nd night do exactly what we were doing very relaxed, while contiki tours coming through at the end of their tour (day 13) are a partying real hard. So perhaps the atmosphere will change. Although, when I asked him about the amount of couples on the other tours he smiled and said that from his view it didn't look too good and that most of the other tours are less coupled. Either way it is a lot better being with a bunch of people, versus treking alone through NZ. So I am excited for the rest of the trip.

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