At 5.30 it was dry but that didn't last long before the forecast rain started to fall and continued as such until about 1230. No morning walk so I went to the gym before breakfast, we had a mid morning coffee at the excellent olde worlde cafe, Florence's, opposite the resort and late morning we made a family decision to go and do our big shop for the week at New World......braving the weather and the Xmas shoppers.....that said although there were lots of shoppe...

Today we decided to tackle the Rob Roy Glacier Track described as 10km - medium - 3-4hours round trip. First we had to drive through Wanaka and out to Raspberry Creek car park in the Mount Aspiring National Park. The journey took approximately an hour, half of which was on an unsealed road. On the plus side it was picturesque as we drove along the bottom of a wide u- shaped glacial valley. The fertile soil made good pasture for livestock farming - sheep, cattle a...

A cooler morning with a strong southerly wind dawned as we headed to Queenstown for some retail therapy and an afternoon visiting the historic gold mining town of Arrowtown. As we parked and emerged from the car jackets were definitely the order of the day, next stop was a bakery for hot coffee. Queenstown shopping area is nice and compact - lots of shops selling NZ products - and plenty possum merino products to peruse......needless to say we bought some - a ja...

Today we decided we would drive the few kilometres to Albert Town and then walk the 11 km riverside track to Lake Hawea and back (total 22 km). We left at 0930 ish and returned after a really good walk. The only frustration was a sign about halfway through that said 4 km to go - but it was more like six - and we were getting hungry! When we arrived in Hawea we found a cafe and sat outside drinking a much needed coffee while waiting for our brunch - John had an al...

Today we decided was an exploration by car day so after a quick session in the gym we headed north west towards the West coast and a small settlement called Haast. There was a definite chill in the air and although it got warmer there was still a nip in the wind. The trip took us along the shores of Lake Hawea and then along the upper shores of Lake Wanaka....this lake is really large. Just after the Haast pass we had to sit for 30 minutes as road workers were s...