Queenstown

So I did end up making it to Queenstown this past weekend, and man was that a good idea. One of my flatmates, Steve, bought his own car and had made the decision that he was going... so I took advantage of that right away. We piled some more of our friends in the car with us, and headed out to Queenstown. Right before we left, I called and booked us all a pretty nice hostel, Pinewood, that was only a few minutes walk into town.

Steve, Kylie, Garrett, Alison and I all made it to Pinewood rather uneventfully. A second car full of more friends was on their way, so while we waited we went into the town to explore. Though I've never been to Colorado, everyone else I drove with goes to school there. They all consensually agreed that Queenstown seemed a lot like Vail, CO, but way cooler. Queenstown is nicknamed the adventure capital of the world, and rightly so. You can do anything extreme there, you name it: ATV-ing, skydiving, whitewater rafting, kayaking, paragliding, hang gliding, ballooning, heli-biking, heli-skiing, and the most famous... bungy jumping (to name a few). It's home to the 2nd highest bungy in the world, the Nevis.

Anyway, in town we happened upon one of the greatest burger joints I've ever eaten at, Fergburger. We all chowed down there, and the 2nd car of people met us there. After hanging out there for a while, we found a bar and causually hung out there for part of the night also. The bar, World Bar, had a pretty funny drink situation going on... they served teapots with many various mixed drinks inside. It was also common to drink straight out of the teapot, funny stuff. We played some pool and had a pretty low-key night that night, heading back to the hostel to jump on the trampoline (!) that they had there.

The next morning, we woke up early enough to make it down into town for our appointment to go bungy jumping! Five out of ten of us had signed up to do the Nevis bungy... a 440 foot drop, 2nd biggest in the world next to one in China. We had to take a bus to the actual bungy site, which was about a 45 minute drive. They harnessed us all up, and we had to take a gondola ride out to the actual platform. This bungy was not just off of a cliff, but off of a platform suspended by cables in the middle of the canyon. We each jumped one by one, and it was one of the craziest things I've ever done, hands down. So fun.

After we each jumped, we waited for the bus to bring us back into town. Once back there, we immediately went to go grab some lunch, before heading back to relax for a while at the hostel. Steve and Alison had to head back to Dunedin for a field trip the next day, so Garrett, Kylie and I had to switch rooms and find a bus that would take us back on Sunday. After switching rooms and getting settled, some of us ventured back into town to walk around for a while. There were tons of ski/skate shops around, and it was nice to be able to relax and take our time for a little while. We grabbed some beer to bring back to the hostel, and hung out playing card games with all 8 of us before getting ready to go out for the night. All of us went out to a few bars that night as well, and stayed out well into the night, passing out hard enough to miss our 10 o'clock checkout the next morning.

Once we actually got checked out and straightened up the room in the hostel on Sunday morning, we headed back into town for a real breakfast. We all had a pretty great time recounting the night before and getting some good food in our stomachs. Finishing up, there wasn't a whole lot of time to kill before we had to catch our bus back, so we headed down toward Lake Wakatipu to hang out before leaving Queenstown. We threw around a frisbee and hung around listening to our friend play his guitar... a nice way to end our trip. The ride back wasn't too bad, and a bunch of us ended up watching the first Lord of the Rings that night back in Dunedin... something we'd been meaning to do in New Zealand for a few weeks now.

Anyway, Queenstown was definitely one of my favorite trips that I've down since being here, and everyone I went with agreed that it would not be our last time visiting there. Garrett, my friend Chris, and I have been eyeing a car on TradeMe (NZ's version of eBay), and the auction ends Friday. Wish us luck...

And check the pics on Picasa! There's some bungy ones up there now too.