Queenstown - Day 1

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After at lot of humming and hahing about where we (Anshu & I) wanted to go to (and there were many exotic locations on our list, from Egypt, Syria, Turkey to Mexico, Guatemala & Jamaica) we finally decided to go visit our own back yard with the worldwide recession at the moment it was a cheaper option budget wise but we were hoping that it would we as spendid as an overseas holiday. HAd no idea what to expect as most of the pics we had seen of the South ISland were winter photos when the entire area is covered in a magical blanket of white snow. We are going in summer - would there at least be a bit of snow? Would it still be magical?

There's no turning back as the flights have been booked the rental car has been paid for and all the accomodation booked. Our flight leves at 6:40AM. We arrive at the airport on time and check ourselves in. HAving never been on a domestic flight, I am quite exciting with the self check in option. We went up to the automated machine and it scanned our e-tickets and gave us our boarding passes and bag tags all we had to do next us to dump the bags on the conveyor belt.....sorted. We have a 45 min transit in Christchurch and then its off to Queenstown at 8:30AM.

Collect our bag and its straight to the car rental company to collect our car for the trip. We booked with Ace as they were the cheapest at the time and gave us a free day =)) All up for 10 day of car hire we paid $505.40, this included the free day and the full insurance cover, all we had to do was ride and return the car with a full tank of gas (just the way we got it). All contracts signed we were taken to our 1500cc Toyota Corolla and off we went. JUst kept thinking we might have been too cheap getting the 1500cc car, would be able to handle the mountainous terrain we were heading for? would there be queues of cars behind us waiting to over take us? Oh well we had decided that we would just pull over and enjoy the scenery if cars started piling up behind us......we were going on a holiday after all and in no hurry at all.

Even though we have booked our accomodation we have no idea what we are going to do each day and we didnt actually get around to planning the activities, so we are hoping to get to each place and kinda feel our way around. So we explore Queenstown a bit, starting with Lake Wakatipu then the city centre. Decide to check into our accomodation and then do some more exploring. IN Queenstown we stayed at "Butterfly Lodge", quite a cozy little place with excellent showers =) The guy tells us there has been a power failure the day before and we are not showing as having made a booking and that they are full!! Unhbelievable!! Luckily we had a print out of the email confirming that our place had been booked. They found two beds real fast. Had a cup of tea. Next we decided to head into town for some lunch and a bit more exploring. Had subway for lunch and explored the Lake shores a bit more then decided to head to Glenorchy for the afternoon as it was some 40kms away and meant to be one of the most scenic drives in the South ISland as the entire drive is along the shoreline of LAke Wakatipu!

The drive to Glenorchy was absolutely beautiful, the Lake was so blue and in the distance we could see some mountains with little snow caps. We stopped a lot along the way to stop and enjoy the scenery and take pics. In Glenorchy we decided to take off our shoes and dip our feet into the water as we strolled along the Lake. Some rabid dog decided to follow us and then suddenly after following us for like 20 mins he decide to turn on us and starts trying to bite us! Shit! I quickly grabbed a big stick to give ward him of - he looked mad!
After enjoying playing around in the Lake and having taken enough pics we decided to head back to Queenstown. As it was already early evening we decided to get some essential from the general store in Glenorchy (milk, bread, eggs and a bar of chocolate). Back to Queenstown we drove having enjoyed the first day of our holiday.

BAck in Queenstown we had a shower and headed back into the city centre to have a look around. Explored the town a bit more and found a nice little Thai take away to have dinner at. Yummy. BAck to the Lodge for an early night as we have a long drive tomorrow - we are driving to Milford Sound.

Interesting trivia - LAke Wakatipu is a remnant of a giant glacial valley carved out over four ice ages and 200 million years of erosion. Lake Wakatipu is over 1 km deep at its deepest point. The strangest phenomenon of Lake Wakatipu is an anomaly called sieches. The level of the lake can rise and fall 12cm within 5 mins. This is attributed to weather conditions and atmospheric conditions, local Maori however believe this is caused by the breathing of the great giant Matau.

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Photos

Sunrise
View from aircraft as we fly to Christchurch.

Sunrise over Christchurch
The clouds have cleared and it looks like a spectacular day ahead.

Three wise men
at Queenstown airport.

My friend & I
starting of our holiday.

Ans & I
relaxing on the pier =)

The pier
at Lake Wakatipu

Lake Wakatipu shores
near the city centre.

Cathy on the swing
we found tucked away the the shores.

Me have a go
on the swing.

Queenstown city view
with the remarkable mountains behind me thinks, or some mountains.

Rocks at shores
of Lake Wakatipu.

Anshu like an energiser bunny
after some Subway and a coke!

Looking cool
even though I was hot and tired from climb that small hill....the training begins for the glacier walk.

On our way to Glenorchy
roadside views.