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...are just three of the things we have not done in Queenstown.
Instead, we went all high-class and honeymoony and took a sightseeing plane over the Milford Sound, went on a cruise up and down it, and flew back again. It was 100% fabulous. It was like our experience in Iguassu Falls - nature being massive and powerful again... and again, the scale of it won't show up in photos. Milford Sound is a huge fjord - this means where a glacier has cut through the land, forming an inlet from the sea. As the glacier is so big and powerful, you end up with huge sheer cliffs all the way, dotted with waterfalls. New Zealand - like South America - is all about amazing geology. Of course, Suzie knows her igneous from her metamorphic already but for Andrew these were all just things you coloured-in in Mr Piper's class - but here it all feels really real and relevant, mainly just because it's all so BIG!
Again, though, we were dead lucky with the weather. We'd booked our flight for 8am and were told to call their confirmation line at 7am... and it was cancelled due to rain and cloud. We were added to the list for the 2.30pm flight, were told it didn't look likely and went back to sleep for four hours.
And woke up to glorious sunshine and called up to find we could go! The weather here is pretty mental - that's what happens when you're a wee island in the middle of nowhere with Antarctica one way and Australia the other.
Again, the flight is the extravagent way for doing it, but it saves two days of driving etc over doing it other ways... and it's just brilliant. A few companies offer the flights... but actually they're all operated by the same people in the same planes. Avoid 'Real Journeys' as they'll put you on a massive boat - we booked with Milford Scenic Flights and the boat was the Mitre Peak - a lovely little thing that ensured we had great views of everything (make sure you're among the first 16 onto the boat so you get a seat upstairs though!). 'Hi' to Mal and Liz, a fun couple we met on the trip.
We really liked Queenstown, despite pretty bad reviews all over the place. Lonely Planet, and others, dismiss it as a touristy place that's only worth visiting if you want to do some of the EXTREME activities on offer, but that's really not fair. It's in a stunning location on Lake Wakatipu, surrounded by hills, has good accommodation, decent shops and great bars and restaurants.
Speaking fo which, we decided to go out for a slap-up treat meal to mark the end of our time in NZ and opted for Botswana Butchery, a cool and classy looking place that attracted us partly by offering a 1.4kg lamb shoulder for two people and partly by just having a great unpretentious atmosphere. And things went well: we chose a wine that we'd tasted in Marlborough, had super-tasty starters and got chatting to the couple at the next table who were celebrating their anniversary. And, of course, it turned out they owned the place. To cut a long story short, our main courses didn't come for well over an hour after our starters (by which time we were well into our second bottle of wine, a pinot noir from the Central O region recommended to us by the owners) and to apologise for the delay, the owners gave us THE WHOLE MEAL FOR FREE!
Now, it would of course be vulgar to say exactly how much that would have cost. But suffice to say it was LOADS! What a lovely, lovely thing to do, and they were lovely people too. Go and eat there - the food and drink was totally fabulous and the experience great (apart from the bad service bit).
Instead, we went all high-class and honeymoony and took a sightseeing plane over the Milford Sound, went on a cruise up and down it, and flew back again. It was 100% fabulous. It was like our experience in Iguassu Falls - nature being massive and powerful again... and again, the scale of it won't show up in photos. Milford Sound is a huge fjord - this means where a glacier has cut through the land, forming an inlet from the sea. As the glacier is so big and powerful, you end up with huge sheer cliffs all the way, dotted with waterfalls. New Zealand - like South America - is all about amazing geology. Of course, Suzie knows her igneous from her metamorphic already but for Andrew these were all just things you coloured-in in Mr Piper's class - but here it all feels really real and relevant, mainly just because it's all so BIG!
Again, though, we were dead lucky with the weather. We'd booked our flight for 8am and were told to call their confirmation line at 7am... and it was cancelled due to rain and cloud. We were added to the list for the 2.30pm flight, were told it didn't look likely and went back to sleep for four hours.
And woke up to glorious sunshine and called up to find we could go! The weather here is pretty mental - that's what happens when you're a wee island in the middle of nowhere with Antarctica one way and Australia the other.
Again, the flight is the extravagent way for doing it, but it saves two days of driving etc over doing it other ways... and it's just brilliant. A few companies offer the flights... but actually they're all operated by the same people in the same planes. Avoid 'Real Journeys' as they'll put you on a massive boat - we booked with Milford Scenic Flights and the boat was the Mitre Peak - a lovely little thing that ensured we had great views of everything (make sure you're among the first 16 onto the boat so you get a seat upstairs though!). 'Hi' to Mal and Liz, a fun couple we met on the trip.
We really liked Queenstown, despite pretty bad reviews all over the place. Lonely Planet, and others, dismiss it as a touristy place that's only worth visiting if you want to do some of the EXTREME activities on offer, but that's really not fair. It's in a stunning location on Lake Wakatipu, surrounded by hills, has good accommodation, decent shops and great bars and restaurants.
Speaking fo which, we decided to go out for a slap-up treat meal to mark the end of our time in NZ and opted for Botswana Butchery, a cool and classy looking place that attracted us partly by offering a 1.4kg lamb shoulder for two people and partly by just having a great unpretentious atmosphere. And things went well: we chose a wine that we'd tasted in Marlborough, had super-tasty starters and got chatting to the couple at the next table who were celebrating their anniversary. And, of course, it turned out they owned the place. To cut a long story short, our main courses didn't come for well over an hour after our starters (by which time we were well into our second bottle of wine, a pinot noir from the Central O region recommended to us by the owners) and to apologise for the delay, the owners gave us THE WHOLE MEAL FOR FREE!
Now, it would of course be vulgar to say exactly how much that would have cost. But suffice to say it was LOADS! What a lovely, lovely thing to do, and they were lovely people too. Go and eat there - the food and drink was totally fabulous and the experience great (apart from the bad service bit).
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