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April 08
From Mount Cook we drove to Queenstown which is a really beautiful place, as you approach there is a huge lake with mountains surrounding the city, plus there are lots of lovely bars and restaurants! As Queenstown is lively we thought it would be a good place to spend my birthday. Great idea, except when we went to draw money out the bank it had frozen our card as they thought it was being used fraudulantly. The banks phone service was not 24hour so we had to wait until 8 that evening before we could call them. So for my birthday we had the equivilent of 9 pounds to spend ! We decided to waste a few hours having ´one drink´ each whilst doing a pub quiz, plus the winners got thirty pounds worth of beer vouchers so we really needed to win! However it soon became apparent that that wasn´t going to happen, the first round was a picture round on New Zealand celebrities ! We weren´t much more knowledgeable in any of the other rounds either and we came second to last. After 8pm we did get in touch with the bank and were able to
get hold of some cash, hurray ! We went to a few bars and I drowned my sorrows at the fact that I could no longer be classed as ´mid twenties' and was now officially old.
During one of our days in Queenstown we parked the van next to the lake and started to make some lunch (instant mash and beans ,very classy) we got talking to a local who was fishing there, after chatting for a while he asked how we were finding living in the campervan, great we said apart from not having a bathroom. He then told us where he lived and invited us to go and use his shower whenever we wanted ! He normally just left his place unlocked so we wouldn´t need a key, unbelieveable. It was so kind of him to offer , we have found that most kiwi´s are incredibly friendly and generous.
We then decided to go to Dunedin, its a fairly big place which we really liked (it also has the steepest street in the world ! ). We went on a brilliant day trip to the Otago Peninsular to see Albatross, fur seals and penguins. The best
part of the day was walking along a beach full of sealions sleeping, they are huge ! Whilst we were there a couple of them woke up and decided to waddle down the beach to the sea, we were able to follow them and get quite close to take pictures, it was superb!
We then made our way down to the Catlins for the next day or so which is the furthest south you can go in New Zealand. A beautiful, scenic coastal road takes you to various spots to stop off along the way and have a walk/explore. We went to Nugget Point which is an old light house with fur seals living at the bottom of it´s cliff, then to a nice waterfall which did exactly what it said on the tin ! Our last stop was to Porpoise Bay for some dolphin spotting, it was amazing to see them playing around in the sea and it was perfect timing as the sun was just setting. Absolutely beltin!
Back to Queenstown was the next roadtrip as it was on the way, plus we really liked it. This time we went up the Gondola to see the
views and also went on ´the luge´which is quite similar to the one in Singapore. The difference being that Queenstown has an advanced track for the lunatics who want to go even quicker, Cabbie was obviously straight on it, I was a bit wimpy and stayed on the beginner track, it was slightly embarrassing being over taken by small children and old ladies but such good fun!
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