We are both very competitive and can't resist a pool or crazy golf challenge when we see one.

In Queenstown we stumbled across Harry's Pool & Sports bar which has about 8 pool tables. These aren't your ordinary pub pool tables that have a greater slope than a black run. These are dead level and the best we've ever played on. They also worked to my advantage as I like to pot my way to victory, unlike Richard who plays the game very tactically and more like snooker. After several games over the nights we've been in Queenstown I was declared the winner of our best of 3 matches with a 4-1 thrashing!

I needed that as Richard won crazy golf by 3 holes and a round of 47 to my 51.

After our own sporting activities we were planning on spending a day lazing around on the grass watching New Zealand and the West Indies play a one day cricket match. However, rain was forecast so we decided to give it a miss. Good job as for most of the afternoon it was bucketing it down.

On Monday the sun shone so we headed along the lake road to a town called Glenorchy. We knew the town wouldn't be very big, but we didn't expect it not to have a supermarket! Not even a Four Square, which is similar to a Spar and seems to be in every New Zealand town. Luckily we found a tin of beans at the back of our storage trays, so after cooking up a lunch of beans on toast we had a short walk along the marsh land and then watched the wind surfers and kite surfer on the lake. I can see why the place attracted such sports as it was very, very windy.

In and around the Queenstown area gold was discovered in the 1800's. We went to Arrowtown which is one of the towns created in the gold rush. There's not a huge amount there, just a pretty little street and a river where you can pan for gold. They've restored some of the old houses from when the Chinese settled after the gold rush to make a living from the gold that remained.

Over the last few days the holiday park we are staying in has got increasingly busy. The miserable cleaner didn't change her daily routine for cleaning the shower and toilet block which involved closing the men's for an hour in the morning followed by the women's for the same amount of time. So for over two hours there's only half as many toilets and showers available. Great. Well in actual fact apart from the queues around the busy period it worked to our advantage as the block that wasn't being cleaned was turned into unisex. So rather than paying the extortionate $1 each for an 8 minute shower we shared one. A grand saving of $11 over our length of stay. I wouldn't mind but who needs an 8 minute shower anyway? And these are the people who are crazy about saving the environment.

New Year's Eve. Well I'm still recovering from the hangover as I write. It started off with a quiet game of pool in Harry's bar where I sealed my win. Then we went onto a pub called Dux de Lux as it has its own micro brewery with great tasting beer. We still haven't quite worked out their pricing structure, $5 for 330ml or $16.50 for a 2-litre jug, but the jug isn't advertised on their menu. You appear to just have to know about it. Anyway we opted for the jug, well jugs. It was New Year's Eve after all.

I don't know whether it was because it was New Year's Eve or not, but New Zealand suddenly woke up and spoke. A guy from Timaru sparked up a random conversation with Richard. He was with a group of mates who had just come down to Queenstown for the evening. They hadn't booked anywhere to stay. His accommodation plan was to get drunk, fall asleep on the pavement, get picked up by the police and put in the cells to sober up.

We then got chatting to an English couple who we'd seen around our holiday park. They were wearing wrist bands which we'd seen other people in the park wearing. Apparently if you looked like you might be loud and cause trouble the park charged you a $50 deposit and made you put a wrist band on!

At about a quarter to midnight the pub virtually emptied as crowds gathered to watch fireworks at the lake. We stayed in the pub and sat by the burning log fire - it almost felt like New Year in Britain.

Katy