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Published: September 17th 2006
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Hey guys, last couple of days have been really busy, we stayed a night in Haas, taking time to stop off at the franz joseph glascier which was absolutely breath taking, on the way down from reefton to queenstown. The next day we drove on the most beautiful drives I've ever seen and one that is ranked in the top 10 in the world, in towards queenstown through the mountains and around the lakes, we stopped for lunch at lake wanaka which is about an hour from queenstown and went into some shops and most excitingly in to puzzle world! (let me hear you all say a big oooohhhhhh!!) we went there as kind of a joke cos it looked a bit childish, and it really was. But it had some really cool illusion exibits and a giant maze which me and ali kicked craig and beckys asses in (they gave up after a while but we decided we were gonna stick it out). After Wanaka we continued on the drive through to queenstown and about 10K's out we got stopped at some roadworks and noone moved for about 10 mins and we were begging to wonder what was going on,
Kia
local kia takes offence at someone trying to take away his livelyhood and what we were going to do, this is NZ after all and going a different route would have taken several hours! After a while a lady came down the que of cars to let us know they were re opening the road soon but the had been removing bolders in an attempt to stop rock falls (which we thought was fair enough!). We found a really nice place to stay in a little self contain unit and some how through lots of me and craig umming and ahhing managed to get an appartment that should cost $310 a night for $170!! we were unsurprisingly chuffed with ourselfs and decided to go out and get some fish and chips and beer to celebrate to put this into context we are staying in a 3 bedroom 2 bathroom unit with a fully equipt kitchen, TV, DVD, washing machine and dryer for $42.50 each( 15 pounds!). So that was thursday.
Friday we decided to go skiing, now queenstown has the misfortune to be slap bang in the middle of 3 ski fields, giving us the hassle of trying to work out which one to go for, we settle on coronet peak,
an anoyingly long 20 min drive from our motel, lol, we decided to opt for the twighlight combo giving us full ski passes from midday till 9 oclock at night and as none of us had ever night skiied we thought we would give it a go. It was a really cool day and between us we managed to teach ali to ski to quite a good level. The only low point of the day was when I made the stupid mistake of thinking that ali had learned enought to come up to the top of the mountain and try and find an easy route down, It was not a fun experience for either of us, half way down ali decided she had had enough and took her skiis off and started trying to walk down a very steep mountain, I really didnt know what to do but escort her slowly down, appologising all the way, at one point ali slipped, landed on her bum and started slidding down the mountain, I pointed my skiis down hill and followed as fast as I could trying to work out my best plan of action after about 400 meters of sliding she
came to a stop and by the time I got to her she couldnt stop laughing, we deicded that she had subconsciously made the decison that this way would be much faster, after getting down we both needed a drink and with 4 hours of our ski passes left I underestimated ali by think she may never ski again and in less than 40 mins she was back on a chair lift headed for the begginer slopes. I was really proud of her for getting up there and doing it again after what was clearly a traumatic experience and she had a few really good runs and has said she would definately do it again!
we got back from a full days skiing just after 8 had a couple bears and promtly crashed out in bed in preperation for saturdays trip to milford sound which was due to pick us up at 6:50 the next morning! Milford sound was amazing it is a fjord formed by ancient glasciers and has loads of waterfalls and beautiful scenery leading out to the tasman sea, because of the layout of the area and the fact it is in one of the largest
what a view
view over queenstown national parks in the world it only has one road in and out, this road turns a journey less than 110K's (1 and a bit hours) as the crowe flys into a 5 hour drive, that is why the coach picked us up so early and why after a drive there a 2 hour cruise and a drive home we were all ready for a good sleep.
Today has been spent wondering dayzed from the last couple days round souvener shops and other parts of queenstown and tommorrow sees us head off for dunedin where we are assured by Craig there will be a couple good nights out! well I feel like I've been rambling so I'm gonna leave it there, hope you enjoy the pics!
Ali and Stew
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Tom
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Good on you, ali - don't give up on the skiing it's lots of fun and always in beautiful parts of the world! Cheers, Stewart - Hi, Craig... tom