We spent a few days in thievery active town of Queenstown on Lake Wakitapu. This is the adventure capital of New Zealand with every possible activity ever created. It’s a good place for sight seeing, shopping and eating.The old steamship plods it’s way down the lake every day to take tourists to a sheep station and jet boats leave in a more hurried fashion to take thrill seekers through the gorge of the Shotover River.
Nearby, is the little gold mining town of Arrowtown with its cute little miners cottages, old fashioned street scape and tourist shops selling extremely expensive, but very nice knitwear.
After two nights in Queenstown, we drove on to Wanaka on the road over the Cown Range. This road is a lot shorter than traveling along the highway through Cromwell and is far mor spectacular. There are some fantastic views from the road as well as traveling through the old gold mining village of Cardrona with its historic old pub right on the roadside.
Wanaka is a good place to get a view of Mt Aspring. You could get a much closer look with walking boots and a pack, but without them, we had to settle for this view across the lake.
Once in Wanaa, we found ourselves in the middle of a giant triathlon event. This is the weekend of the famous Wanaka Challenge which draws participants from all over the world. The event takes place over four days and includes a 4km swim, 180 km bike ride and a 42 km run. Wanaka is a very busy little town at the best of times, but with road closures and detours for this event, it was almost impossible to find a parking spot.
We are here for only one night and then we are off to the West Coast.
