Day 4: Queenstown
After our tour of Milford Sound we gathered our things off of the boat and headed towards Queenstown. The town of Queenstown is interesting because it's a very small town with a few big town elements to it. There are some unique bars and shops to visit but Queenstown is mostly known for its high adrenaline type activities, everywhere you turn there are activities to be done for all ages and styles. On our tour we had a choice of doing anywhere from 0 - 3 activities in the time we had. Activities included skydiving, hangliding, wine tasting tours, speedboating, bungy jumping, horseback riding to name a few.
We arrived at our hotel, the Rydges, by early afternoon which we later found out to be the place where the crew of Lord of the Rings stayed.
The hotel overlooked the river and was just a few blocks away from the main town area. Overhead you could see the mountains surrounding the little town and above that you could see people parachuting.
As nice as the Rydges was, one of the odd things about it were the faucets, one cold and one hot. According to my research this is an old style for setting up sinks which is odd to me why they would be this way however I noticed that this seems to be the standard in New Zealand; in fact Australia has a few sinks in ths style too.
We were left to our own devices for the rest of the afternoon and I took the opportunity to meet with my flatmate Elena who was also traveling around New Zealand on a different trip as well as look at the Queenstown shops. Queenstown is a good spot to do your souvenir shopping and postcard sending because they have lots of places to do both; sometimes you can even do both in one place.
Later that night most of the people on my tour went out to a bar called Minus 5 Degrees which has been nicknamed the "ice bar" because of it's chilly interior. They have ice sculptures which are changed once a week inside the bar and you get a parka and mitts as part of your cover charge to enter the bar.
And thus we ended our day in Queenstown with more fun activities planned for the next day.
We arrived at our hotel, the Rydges, by early afternoon which we later found out to be the place where the crew of Lord of the Rings stayed.
The hotel overlooked the river and was just a few blocks away from the main town area. Overhead you could see the mountains surrounding the little town and above that you could see people parachuting.
As nice as the Rydges was, one of the odd things about it were the faucets, one cold and one hot. According to my research this is an old style for setting up sinks which is odd to me why they would be this way however I noticed that this seems to be the standard in New Zealand; in fact Australia has a few sinks in ths style too.
We were left to our own devices for the rest of the afternoon and I took the opportunity to meet with my flatmate Elena who was also traveling around New Zealand on a different trip as well as look at the Queenstown shops. Queenstown is a good spot to do your souvenir shopping and postcard sending because they have lots of places to do both; sometimes you can even do both in one place.
Later that night most of the people on my tour went out to a bar called Minus 5 Degrees which has been nicknamed the "ice bar" because of it's chilly interior. They have ice sculptures which are changed once a week inside the bar and you get a parka and mitts as part of your cover charge to enter the bar.
And thus we ended our day in Queenstown with more fun activities planned for the next day.
Labels: vacation
posted by Compmouse at 9:17 PM
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