Queenstown

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After our time in Franz Josef, we made the long drive to Queenstown, stopping for lunch at Wanaka which is a small town overlooking a large beautiful lake. We enjoyed walking around and stopped at the water's edge to feed a mass of ducks as well as a rather frightening flock of seagulls with pointy beaks that kept diving for us.

After a devious diversion by Bean, we found ourselves once again browsing the ailes in New World (where else!!) and after imaptient moanings by Anna we finally left and got back on the road.

We arrived in Queenstown just as the sun was going down. The centre was lit up with pretty bars, restautants and ski shops and looked very romantic and sparkly. After finding that all the hostels were full and a bit pricey, we stumbled across a motel and asked if they had any vacancies. We couldn't believe our eyes as the owner agreed to do us a backpacker deal and showed us to a big room, fully heated with double beds, private bathroom and shower, kitchen, TV, tea & coffee and ELECTRIC BLANKETS!!!!!!! We literally bounced through the room yelping and squealing. Yes, this was very exciting. So, what did we do? We went food shopping!! We came back arms filled with pasta for that evening, followed by microwave popcorn and chocolate biscuits and tea and ingredients for a full fry up in the morning!! We sat in bed giggling and gurgling over our lovely heated blankets, hot water bottles and biscuits and sat there quite contently watching TV well into the evening...

The next day after a blissful night's sleep and a lovely full English Breakfast we went for a drive around the local area. We went around the lake stopping at various view points and once in the middle of the road to take photos of icicles frozen over a waterfall. We drove up to the deer park that looks over Queenstown and then back into the centre where we walked around a pretty graveyard and then strolled around the centre. It was lovely walking around and reminded us of Christmas back at home.

We headed back "home" as it started to get dark and stooped en route at a choloate shop where we had fresh home made hot chocloates and 2 sneaky truffles.

That evening we decided to go out and hit the town! We wanted to go the the ice bar we had seen (literally a bar made entirely out of ice, including the glasses and the menues etc) but unfortunatly it was shut, so we opted for a lively bar instead. Inside there was a roaring fire and wooden interior. It was really pretty. We had to shed sevearl layers very quickly. It was really packed as there was speed dating that night (not intentional on our part in any way!) We had some wine and got chatting to some nice Australian guys who dragged us on to the dance floor. A few hours and a lot of dancing later we returned home in the cold night air and we saw a shooting star. It was a brilliant night.

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Comments

[Panda]

Ice Bar!
hey guys just thought I'd let you know - all is not lost with the Ice Bar! Know its not quite Australia but I've been to an Absolut Vodka bar in London twice in the past year - its ace! You get a free cocktail when you go in (mm!) and everything is actually made of ice! Woth a trip on your return to the UK me thinks ;o) xxx