Inside Queenstown

This post will probably be quite short, as I have already written about the Deer Park, and that was our highlight for Queenstown.

I had mentioned that the Deer Park has all of these adventure options, and that makes sense, because Queenstown is the adventure capital of New Zealand. There is rafting, luge, bungee jumping, skiing (with or without helicopters), and sundry other activities, which is great, but not something that we were particularly interested in. We are lame in that way.

We had heard that Queenstown had good shopping, so that was something we looked at, but after wandering through many stores, we did not find anything we really wanted. (This included looking in three different bookstores for Five Kiwi in a Kombi.)

So, why go to Queenstown? Well, there are really two reasons for it. (That's two reasons for us. If you are into adventure activities, go for it. If you are more into shopping, I'd say our best luck there was Queen Street in Auckland.)

First off, for the places we wanted to go, it was the most logical airport to use. There is an airport in Christchurch, but that puts you considerably further north, and we pretty much stayed in the southernmost third of the South Island.

The other thing to think about is that it is absolutely beautiful. Those adventure activities work because you have mountains and rivers and lakes, and it was some of the most gorgeous scenery I've ever seen. That doesn't mean you have to spend a long time in the city. We basically had the one day, plus our trip out, and I'm not sure you can drive in any direction without seeing something breathtaking. Like the rest of the island, the air is fresh and pure, and being there just feels good.

Population-wise, it is somewhere between Te Anau and Dunedin. Dunedin like most university cities. A large part of the population is college students, but there are a lot of businesses supporting that, as well as the tourism, so you have a lot of regular residents. Te Anau is mainly vacation homes, that are rented out more as investments than used by the owners. There are some regular residents, but it gets pretty empty in the off-season.

Queenstown is based on tourism, but there are more hotels and hostels than vacation homes, so more support staff is needed. A lot of the tourists are young adrenaline junkies, so it feels more alive, but not homey. Most of the people who work there are from other parts of the country, and they are only there temporarily.

There were two interesting encounters. On our way back to the hotel for the night, we stopped in a grocery store, and as we were chatting in line a man behind us said, "Oh good! I was afraid the Americans would stop coming." He was referring to the news of economic disaster. Well, things had been fine when we left. I have no idea how they're doing now. I certainly didn't expect to follow the trip with ten months without income.

The other thing worth noting is that we found an excellent food court, and needing to conserve funds had both lunch and dinner there, in between checking out stores and such. (There is a lovely path around the lake that I only noticed after it was too late to explore it, so that was a regret. If you get there, take a walk around the lake.)

Anyway, I don't remember which meal it was, but we were there and Julie noticed someone familiar in line at McDonalds. It was John and Marie from the Great Barrier Reef.

This was without a doubt the farthest in between jaunts that we had seen anyone. There were people that we kept seeing all around Kangaroo Island and Adelaide, and one family we had seen in Port Douglas, North Queensland had also turned up in Port Arthur, Tasmania, but here we were in a different country--and climate!

With everything that had happened in between, it was almost surprising that we had recognized them, but we talked quite a bit, especially Marie and Julie. They were both a bit concerned about snorkeling, so they talked about that, and then Louise basically towed them both around for the entire time. (She was a strong swimmer.)

Anyway, it was exciting to see them. We chatted and got caught up. They were doing the adventure stuff, and had some close calls skiing, so that was fun, and then we talked about what everyone was doing next. After the second encounter, it becomes acceptable to exchange contact information, so we took e-mail address and promised to send them information on California (which was eventually on their itinerary--they were going a lot of places).

So that was nice. I was glad we ran into them. I kind of wish I had exchanged contact information with Vicky and Camille from Kangaroo Island. Yes, only ran into them at one thing, but it was a two-day thing. It could have counted. Maybe Peter too. (At least one of the Peter's. There were three or four.)

That was our last full day in New Zealand, but we had a good guide who wanted to make sure that we didn't miss any opportunities, so there was one more stop.