Advertisement
The Kiwi bus only stops at Wanaka for one night, for me this was not enough. Wanaka is a small village surrounded on all sides by vast mountains and an extensive lakes, it’s the most picturesque place I’ve stayed so far with the nicest hostel to boot. Four of us from the bus stayed on for some outdoor pursuits, two Danish girls and a Londoner called Raj. Raj and I hired out mountain bikes and went off to find the local trails which proved to be the best I’ve ever done. The area we went to was like a massive ski resort for bikes, there were green, blue and black runs crisscrossing a massive area of parkland, enough to test anyone’s abilities. Unfortunately there were no lifts so after five hours cycling up and down hill we were both completely knackered. The most amazing thing was the scenery, every twenty minutes we came across another lookout point that was quite breathtaking, got a bit snap happy, but in New Zealand its very difficult not to be.
The next stop was Queenstown; this is an activity, extreme sport and party goers Mecca for backpackers. While this town is large by New Zealand standards it’s retained its quaint mountain ski resort atmosphere. Before I arrived into town the bus stopped of at Kawarau Bridge which is the site of the worlds first bungee jump. At 43m it’s not that big but it was still fantastic since you scrape the water at the bottom, I love bungee jumping! On my second day in town myself and the Danish girl I have been traveling with the last few days got the bus up to the Nevis Bungee jump, at 134m high its the second biggest jump in the world. The drive up to the site was quite funny since everyone had varying degrees of fear on there faces. Once strapped in at the small reception area we were taken on a small pod over to the main cable car which is suspended high above the valley floor. Unfortunately they do the jumps heaviest first so I was in the first batch. Standing on the edge of a 134m drop is quite a feeling but nothing compared to diving off it. I enjoyed the jump so much that as soon as they winched me up I got them to strap me in for a second go. At 3 ½ seconds freefall it’s the smoothest jump I’ve done to date, I could happily do it all day. My Danish friend also loves bungee jumping and bounds about in a state of overexcitement before every jump. The previous day at the bridge she mentioned to the bungee guys that she heard that if you did a jump naked you got it for free, word spread amongst the bungee crew and they made her an offer for a free second jump at the Nevis much to our suprise. Once everyone else had been transferred to the reception she stripped off completely then did the jump, very funny and very impressive, it was bloody freezing. The funniest bit was back at the reception when they started playing the video of the jump on a big screen, I’ve never seen anyone move so fast.
After the success of Wanaka four of us decided to have another day Mountain Biking. The man in the rental shop told us to expect some uphill he wasn’t kidding. The hill up to the gondola station took us an hour and that was before we ever found the trail. The trail itself was the most strenuous exercise I’ve done in months; the track itself was rarely more than a foot wide, was covered in tree roots and was often so steep that we had to carry our bikes on our backs for long stretches. Although it was hard work the mountain scenery and forests were well worth the effort. One of the group was a smoker and hence has the lung capacity of a dormouse, unfortunately he forgot his cigarettes so got increasing grouchy as the day progressed, half way up the first mountain he declared “if I have to climb up one more bloody hill your going to witness a grown man cry” poor lad was physically shaking by the time we reached the top of the trail three hours later. At the highest point we had climbed three mountains and were well above the snowline. Fortunately the twenty minute ride down was phenomenal, it had jumps, hairpin bends and lots of high speed run outs; awesome fun. None of us moved that evening got about as far as the hostels hot tub but that’s about it.
Yesterday we all went to Milford Sound for a boat cruise around what is really a fjord, its one of the most incredible areas of natural beauty I’ve ever visited and all I can suggest is shoving it into google image to have a look. I leave Queenstown for Christchurch tomorrow and in the next few days will transfer to the North Island.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.165s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 19; qc: 82; dbt: 0.1212s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
Mazza
non-member comment
Oh yeah!
Funny, your father was always rather keen on Danish girls too! She sound great fun! What a good time you're having. Is this the same guy who was having a back op last August? ? !