We finally left Te Anau half sad as it was such
a great experience and half excited for what lay ahead. Our next stop:
Queenstown. We were told a lot of things about Queenstown. Centre of Kiwi
adrenaline holidays, too busy, amazing place to be, over-priced. As you can
see, both good and bad opinions.
The truth is, all of it is a little true. In
comparison to relaxed Te Anau, it was suddenly super-busy. There are a lot of
people around in such a small town and yes, you can spend your money in a
heartbeat on strange, crazy or cool activities (or all three things in one).
The hotel we are in looks very nice, neat and
new, but the devil lies in the details. The bed mattress is fairly worn
through, the WiFi costs... again (albeit not as much as in Te Anau), none of
the pots and pans of the very large and spacious communal kitchen is really in
good condition, etc. In a nutshell, it looks good and the price seems good, but
it is in fact too pricey for what you get, but you don't see it until it is too
late.
But again, there is the landscape. Oh the
landscape. Queenstown lies at the shores of Lake Wakatipu with its perfectly
turquoise waters surrounded by several mountain chains. I can understand why it
has become so popular.
The time after we arrived, we spent catching up
on things online before we went into town to get some tidbits done and book our
"adventures" for the time we are here. In addition, we found time to
go to the Kiwi Birdlife Park where we saw, you might have guessed, Kiwis and
several other birds found in New Zealand. It was interesting, but in comparison
to the rest, nothing really to write home about... but we have seen a real Kiwi
now, have you? ;)
Afterwards, we went back to the hotel for some
necessary relaxation. The last days were quite full and we needed to recuperate
a bit. Tomorrow, we have again a start at 8:15 am to go on the "Safari of
the Scenes" where we will go on a 4 hour trip to Glenorchy with a 4WD to
look at the sites of some of the places where the Lord of the Rings was shot,
such as Isengard (Thanks Thomas for pointing this trip out to us!).
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