The drive down from Fox Glacier to Queenstown was amazing. The clouds had lifted and we could actually see some of the mountains that had been hiding behind. The road twisted and turned, up and down hills, through valleys, by serene lakes and passed waterfalls...absolutely beautiful and so refreshing after the rain of the last few days. However, upon trying to get out of the car to have a picnic lunch we were almost eaten alive by sandflies so decided the views were definately easier to appreciate from inside the safety of Sunny. On the way we stopped at Puzzling World in Wanaka, a really cool centre with lots of optical illusions, puzzles and the worlds 1st 3D maze! To complete the maze you had to reach all four coloured corner towers and then get back to the start point...what with our superior mental abilities we completed the maze in under half an hour, very impressive!

The centre of Queenstown itself was very touristy and busy, as was to be expected, but down by the lakeside and the surrounding mountain scenery more than made up for it. On Valentines day (yes Ben, still awaiting my present...a lilly stolen from the pond is cheating) we strolled through the Botanic Gardens and had a picnic alongside the lake which was nice. The Gardens also had frisbee golf set up which looked good fun, but we didnt play for fear I might kill someone by accident. In the evening we went out for a seafood dinner (not fish and chips this time, we actually ate a proper meal!) and visited the local casino as I'd never been to one before. It was very small and quite a depressing place to be honest! We then went onto another bar which had offers on cocktails but it was soon taken over by crazy Kiwi Experiencers, or a similar group, so we made a hasty exit.

The next day we had a look around town and drank tea at an amazing (but expensive) chocolate shop called Patagonia Chocolates. After sitting for half an hour oogling the chocolates we gave in and shared a dark chocolate and macadamia nut ice cream which was divine and came in the biggest waffle cone ever! In the afternoon Ben did his bungy jump, which I'll let him tell you about...

-S