Blogs from Queenstown, Otago, South Island, New Zealand, Oceania - page 9

Ok, so the location of this entry is actually a lie. I’m no longer in the South Island, or even New Zealand. I’m actually back home, watching the snow fall and thinking of waxing my skis. But in any case, I WAS on the South Island-most definitely! And it was fantastic. So, if anyone still reads this, here is the story of my last two weeks in New Zealand. (broken into several pages to make it easier to read) It was raining as I flew out of Auckland, but 2 hours later the clouds were gone, allowing for a spectacular view of the mountains as the plane landed in Queenstown. The good weather remained for my entire visit, even on the notoriously wet West Coast. (So, for those of you who are wondering, I do have ... read more

Queenstown 20 years ago is nothing like the Queenstown of today. We remembered a small village with a few streets, the lake, and the streamship Earnslaw. Now, it's a booming tourist town hawking every extreme sport option that you can imagine. As one of our guide books stated, "You can always hear a scream in the air in Queenstown". You have your choice of tandem skydiving, hang gliding, paragliding, wire jetting, 4 different types of bungy jumping, canyoning, canyon swinging, jet boating, white water rafting, white water surfing, and the list goes on and on. There are innumerable ways to spend your money (all options are very expensive) and possibly die in the process. Yesterday, we saw a video advertising downhill biking on a snowy ski slope!! Everyone on the video was falling down within a ... read more

So when I went travelling my mum said I should go and do whatever I want... except a bungy jump. Why this was singled out I don't know. Fortunately the idea didn't appeal to me that much anyway. However, it turns out that it's against New Zealand law to visit Queenstown without jumping off something really high, so we opted for the world's largest swing. Basically you're on a bit of rope that's tied to a cable across a big canyon. You leap off a cliff, freefall the first 60m straight down until the rope becomes taut and brings you swinging across the bottom of the canyon a hundred metres below just nine metres above the river. It's fairly terrifying ( for me anyway ). Sara, who implicitly trusts anyone with a staff T-shirt, went for ... read more

It feels really funny to be writing this all over again especially when it happened more than a year ago. But i reckoned since i've got the photos, why not? It was last June, 2004. Boy was i excited at the thought of going NZ for my FIRST EVERY FREAKING JOB ASSIGNMENT. Perhaps it aint such a big deal to most peeps, but i worked really hard for the chance. Afterall, im not that super duper well to do to trot the world on a personal trip basis. It was a important assignment for me as well. Being the first one, i must say it went successfully enough to propel me to other overseas assignments til today. Still remembered it was Mich's 21st bday party. It clashed with my gala dinner night. Had to get Jackie's ... read more

Not that you can really see me, but the following link is to a couple of pictures from white water rafting. Go to: http://rafting.co.nz/index.cfm/searchImages Then enter December 1st for the date. Go to page 26. The pictures of our raft are 51218526, 51218527, 51218528. I am in the second row closets to the camera. This is not where we got stuck. This was the last rapid. I am still working on finding the pictures from sea kayaking in Abel Tasman. Enjoy!!! ... read more