Tekapo to Queenstown

It's Nomi here again :)

Yesterday we left Lake Tekapo and made our way to Queenstown. Neil got up at 6am to take some sunrise photos before we left. The one of the church with mountains behind is just gorgeous I think. The owners of the resort had a look at our photos and are quite interested in purchasing some, so we will be following that up when we return home.

The weather was quite warm and fairly sunny. We had a short stop at Lake Pukeko,which had amazing views of the alps including Mount Cook, which you could just see amidst the clouds. Neil took a 360 degree panorama down by the shore line. It was so windy there.

About 30km on, just before Omarama, we stopped at a place called Clay Cliffs. It was a 4km gravel road to get there and on private land, but they welcomed visitors and asked for a $5/car donation. We decided it was worth the detour as
we had seen photos on postcards at Tekapo. It was a bit too much of a climb for me, so I relaxed by the car and videoed the area, while Neil went off to take photos of the cathedral-like clay columns.

I have learnt to become extremely patient with Neil's photography. He is in his own little world and sometimes forgets how long he has been gone. This of course makes me worry a bit, but we keep in touch with our little walkie talkies. However, depending on the terrain, they sometimes do not work too well. This was the case here, as there were giant walls of rock between us. During my wait, I felt the need to go to the loo! Without toilets, I had to think of something creative. Boys have it easy, but for girls its a wee bit more difficult! Without going into detail,let's just say a sick bag has more than one use!

On the road again, I took over driving for a short while. We stopped for a bite to eat at Omarama and continued on. We travelled through more little ski towns including Twizel,which was the location where the great battle on Pelenor Fields in Lord of the Rings was shot.

The road to Queenstown was quite windy, but gorgeous scenery all the way. Another hour on, we arrived in Queenstown. Unfortunately the weather had closed in and it was raining. But we were tired and looked forward to relaxing for the rest of the day. We checked into our room at Rydges Hotel (they actually upgraded us for free which was nice), stopped for a cuppa and rest and then went out for dinner at a little place called Fishbone Inn. It was recommended by one of the staff at the hotel and it was excellent food. I had a fish pie on top of mashed potato and mushy peas (mmmmm comfort food). Neil had fish chowder and calamari. The restaurant was actually owned by an Aussie, so we were pleased to hear some Australian music playing in the background.

After a skype webcam chat with our mums and dads, we went to sleep.

A couple more NZ querky things that I thought I'd mention:

The Maori pronunciation for 'Maori', sounds like 'mouldy'.

There does not seem to be any water restrictions here. We have seen fields of grass being watered while it has been raining.

The chests of drawers out near the road with rocks on top are actually bee hives.

We came across lots of cairns (rocks stacked on top of each other) on the roadside. Hundreds of them of different sizes. We have yet to find out what these are. It looks like some sort of hippie ritual thing.

Neil has uploaded another bunch of photos, so be sure to have a look here: http://neil.creek.name/gallery/v/holidays/nz96/

Well that's probably enough for now. Time to get breakfast.

Love NnN
xxx