NZ: Mossburn to Queenstown

January 2, 2012

After a nice shower and a hot breakfast (including some mystery milk from the farm lady  - we're not sure what animal it was from) we partook on an absolutely beautiful drive to Queenstown.

Queenstown has a similar feel to it as Banff, in that it is a resort town for skiing in the winter and other extreme sports in the summer.  We made a quick stop at an internet café, then went straight to Fergburger for lunch.  Now, Fergburger is a burger joint, but not just any old burger joint.  You can tell you've found it by the giant line outside the store, and you know it's good because we waited 25 minutes for two take-away burgers.  I'm not sure why we didn't take any pictures of the food, but the prices were good and the burgers had awesome names like "Cockadoodle Oink" (chicken burger with bacon) and "Sweet Bambi" (venison).  The burgers surpassed all of our expectations.

We had hoped to go paragliding in Queenstown, but didn't end up doing that because we decided we would instead spend the money on Marino Wool clothing - a New Zealand specialty.  Ryan found some shirts, but I didn't have much luck.  It bugged me that none of it was made in New Zealand, and that most of the stores were chains I could find in Australia.  Also, the independent stores made really ugly women's clothing.  After 4 hours I settled on a ball of wool to make my own scarf, and in the end I was very happy with that decision.

As you know we're not really city people, so we promptly left Queenstown and drove north in "pursuit of the rings."  I actually haven't seen all of the Lord of the Rings movies, but I do know that the scenery was spectacular so Ryan lead us on an adventure to a few of the movie sites near Queenstown.  This picture was taken just north of Queenstown before we hit any of the sites, but that 40km stretch of road was breathtaking.

The real fun began once we got on a dirt road that lead to the town called "Paradise."  The pictures obviously don't capture it, but I think it was the prettiest place I've ever been. 

LOTR Site: Lothlorien

LOTR Site: Isengard

We eventually hit some water on the road and had to turn around, but we had seen everything we wanted to see and really enjoyed the peaceful drive.

We decided to camp next to Lake Wanaka (50km NW of Queenstown), which was beautiful but very windy.  The campsite itself was sketchy (with a random mattress lying on the ground nearby), but the views were excellent.

We had planned on using the picnic table to cook dinner, but it was windy and cold.  Lucky for us, Kinloch Lodge was right next to the campsite so it was impossible to resist going in there for dinner.  They had a wood burning fireplace (which we admit was a bit excessive) and we ate absolutely delicious venison pie and eggs benedict for dinner.  Now that we're experts at sleeping through a wind storm (the secret is setting your tent up right and using earplugs), we had an excellent sleep.