Leaving Wanaka today and heading to the adrenline junky town of Queenstown. Wondering off the beaten track allows us to have a relaxing morning, so a perfect opportunity to have a nice lay in with a good breakfast and a lovely scenic walk. Nope that wasn't going to be the case, the weather had turned sour and it was raining so our morning walk was cancelled but we did sit back and relax enjoying the view from the comfort of our hostel playing cards.

On the bus and with only a relatively short trip we only had a few stops. The best stop was to where the first orginial commercial bungi jump had been built. A.J.hackett was the creator of the bungi jump, the jump was situtated off a bridge between two cliffs with a river running below. Due to the wet weather the river had an increase in debris and was flowing really fast not allowing jumpers to be dunked. This however didn't seem to stop the constant flow of crazy mainly backpackers from throwing themselves off, but as it is an activity with have already tried and a little out of our price range we declined the offer to jump!

Did you know that the bungi orginated as usual from the tribes, and if my memory reminds me it is a tradition brought on from the following story.... A lady was being chased by a man and ran to the top of her tree house, however the man followed quickly she tired some elastic vines to her ankles and jumped. The man followed but his vines snapped so while she survived he died. After this man not wanting to be defeated did rituals of jumping off tree houses with these vines attached to prove they could survive. They still do to this day and you can watch this on you tube, but it is not as safe as the special designed bungi's and come at much higher risk of survival.

After watching the several people on our bus who had decided to jump in the rain we were back on the bus and heading to our final destination. We continued on the windy roads until we came into Queenstown, now you would assume this to be a hugh town as it is so well know for it's crazy actictives and is the party capital however this was not so it was actually quite small. It did however burst wih character. It was a little town nestled on the side of the lake surrounded by mountains.  

We arrived at our hostel, again proud with ourselves for booking ahead, but only to be greeted by a miserable lady! If you are a masive Lee Evans fan like myself I can only describe this hostel like he does a maze of corridors going in all types of directions. It was cheap thou and it was what you paid for. 

That night we decided to venture out to explore what the town had to offer. We checked out all the tacky tourist shops  and found some pubs we would like to investigate further later that evening. 

We decided that we had been super good cooking every night and decided we deserved to have a meal out. We had been informed that apart from the crazy activities the only other must in Queenstown was to eat a Furgburger, so we went on the hunt. Straight away you knew you were there, the queue of backpackers ran out the doors and onto the streets. You could tell the regulars they had their own tub of ketchup and brought their own drinks. We however were going all out unaware of what lay instore. We ordered a Hawinan burger and an onik burger plus chips, wow when we opened the package the hugh burger lay there. It was the biggest I had seen and needed two hands and an extension to my mouth. I did manage to squash it down and after an epic munch finish the burger but the added chips were just too much for both of us. Not one to waste we took them with us determind to eat them later. 

Back in the hostel we planned to finish our liquor stores and play some cards, but we got talking to this guy and for some reason decided it would be fun to return to this bar that was offering speed dating. Hana decided it would be a cool "I have never".

Unfortunately and much to my dismay we didn't get signed up. So we headed off to another well know backpackig bar. When we arrived they had a deal buy one get one free on Jager's with an added bonus that if we brought six we got a free t-shirt. Easy we thought until they said that the buy one get one free only counted as one stamp! Let's just say that it became a long drawn out drinking night after that where we meet a pole dancer and drank lots more, even drinking shots the British way out of tea pots. But I did get my souviener t-shirt!!

The next day was an extremely chilled out day of doing nothing, catching up on much needed sleep and other important jobs. 

After a relaxing day yesterday we decided to venture out to explore Queenstown by day. We walked around the beautiful gardens putting the world to right again, by the end of our travels we will be able to solve all political problems. We then endulged in some gorgeous ice-cream, made even better as it gave us a taste of memories of S.A. "delche de leche" my favourite!! It was a small tub of paradise!

Now we have been good and not got hooked up with all the excitement of doing the extreme stuff, so we felt we could treat ourselves to an activity and being very good value for money we decided to give the gondula and ludging a try.

We ended up having so much fun, it had turned out to be a beautiful sunny day. We had a wonderful views off Queenstown as we rose higher and higher on the gondula. At the top we went to watch some people jumping a new craz....The ledge. Similar to the bungi but you run off a ledge and jump to the stunning view over Queenstown.

We then continued on to our highlight.... Ludging! It isn't the biggest adrenline activity and we were slightly concerned when we saw young children and old people having a go, what had we let ourselves into this time! We grabbed our sexy safetly helmets and jumped on a ski lift to the top. For me this is just as scary, you have to wait with your back to the chairs swing round until without any notice it takes out your legs and you are sat down. There is a small saftey bar that wouldn't do anything as we climbed up higher to the top of the mountain. We pulled our silly face for the camera and grew with excitment as we reached the top. Running off the chairs, we ran round to the "scenic track", you had to do this easy track first. We had our quick instructions before we were given our ludge. A luge is a plastic black sledge on wheels, you sit on them like a little go kart and have a lever that when you pull towards you, you slow down but don't push it too far forward as that is your hand brake and this sends you flying at speed! It did take a little controling as you had to use this to turn too, and remember I'm super competitive so need to reach maximum speed to over take Hana!!

We pulled upto the start line, being a little too confident I let Hana lead off first just to keep an eye on her. We shot off and it was so much fun you whizzed around a track similar to go karting that was on a constant sloop down. There were tight corners and big dips, sometime you had to steer through tunnels! It was crazy fun. But it soon came to an end and we slowed to the drop off point, I won this run but it was just are first practice. After this rum we were allowed to do the advance track but having six rides we wanted to enjoy the scenic track just one more time. So we ran around and jumped on to the chair lift but not before having a quick laugh at our silly photos. 

Are second run and we grew in conidence, overtaking others and start to really race each other. We were both always trying to find ways to sneak past or cut the other one up, looking over our shoulders to change direction to stop the other from passing. We laughed a lot, but laughed even more when we checked the picture and some how Hana always manages to look like an old dear driving!!

Deciding we were both happy to try the advance, it was much steeper sloop so you went faster and the corners were much tighter. There were definately a few scream when we did a few two wheelers and the tunnels were much narrower, were Hana seriously cut me up! 

Because we had got a good deal we had a few runs that last all day, so we decided that we would leave the remainder of our runs till later and explore the views more. It was a stunning day even thou it was trying to rain, we could see all of Queenstown and the surrounding landscape. We went to walk the loop around the top and found a great photo opputunity, leave the camera on the post run onto the concrete space and jump for a photo. It was going great until we heard the sound of the helicopter and we sundenly realised where we were, but we chanced faith and waited for our picture hoping it would be done before the helicopter landed on our heads. It was a very close call and within minutes of running off the helicopter had landed. 

We didn't walk far before we got bored and decided to complete our runs before the weather did turn nasty. Much to my dismay and I'm not happy bout writing this.... apart from the filmed one that I am let off for Hana did whip my bottom at the two final races. I'm sure she was cheating some how but that's just because I'm a sore loser. 

After our fantastic day we decided to continue to treat ourselves with dinner out. One of the first meals out in NZ, and it was still a buy one pizza get one free. The heavens had opened up and it was a disarster getting there made even worse when we were ID with no ID, but neither of us wanted to cook so we perserved and lucky we did as it was delisious. Shame it was washed down with just tap water! 

Planning our first day apart in over 5months I booked my trip that night to Milford Sounds, Hana choosing not too as too expensive for scenary already seen. Plus it was going to be good for us. So an early night for me to be ready for my trip. 

Oh dear my day starts as a complete disarster, my alarm fails me and I awake at 8am and have to be at the office by 8.10. It's ok Hana packs me a lunch and while I get ready and I run to the office with what turned out plenty of time. I was a little nervous wihout my travelling bud, but I was fully prepared. I got my own seat to stretch out, but still be able to look out the window.  The bus was even equipped with windows in the celing to allow for views above. It was similar to the Magic bus and although the bus driver say they won't talk too much they do. He explained lots about Queenstown lake and the mountains around. The main mountains are called "the remarkables" because the explore who noticed they ran perfectly north to south muttered "that's remarkable" and the asistance wrote it down. If you watch LOTR these mountains feature lots they filmed for 8 months around here. We stopped several times for photos, to some stunning scenary. The weather was fanstatic, Milford Sounds rains 260 days a year but not today there isn't a cloud in the sky a perfect day especially as it rained heavily yesterday so I get the joy of the waterfalls and sunshine. 

We travel for several hours, on the only road that leads to and from the main attraction. We stop at different mirror lakes, saw waterfalls all along the roadside, saw the major tree slide that had closed Milford Sounds only weeks before we arrived, we drove through hugh mountains and again extremely lucky there had been a lot of snow fall the night before and all the mountains has their cold blankets, we saw hanging glaciers and even saw a spot where a hanging glacier had fallen as an avalange last year that closed the tunnel, there was still snow left so you could only imagine how bad it must of been, we drank fresh water from the streams. Finally we came to the end of the long but stunning drive, to the port. We were about to embark on the famous part of the trip.... A boat cruise through Milford Sounds that infact is actually a fiord not a sound!!! A sound is a mountain range carved by rivers that are then filled by the sea, a fiord is a mountain range carved by glacier that is then filled by the sea but typical the British that discovered it didn't know the difference or the right word and named it wrong, it has now stuck and is too much trouble to change. 

We boarded our old style yaught boat and headed up to the top deck to get a good view and it was stunning. Just hugh mountains covered in green blankets of trees and srubbs rising from the pool of water below. We set sail out into the open water slowly bobbing along watching waterfalls and areas betweeen mountains where glaciers once lived. As we pass by the captain fills us with lots of information explaining that the mountains not only impressive height above the water reaches further down below. We saw perfect strip of nothingness between the trees and he explains that these are tree landsides, because the trees can't root themselves down through the rock they cling to the mountains heavy rainfall will cause them to let go and they tumble takening all below with them. We passed little ledges where there were the odd seals basking in the sunshine, they were so used to the boats and didn't stir once even when we were right on top of them! We continued out into the mouth and dropped the sails when we were out in the open ocean, we followed the coastline and again were in for a bit of luck as some bottled nose dolphins had decided to join us for a star apperance. 

Starting to feel the waves of the boat and lucky for me some of the others were too so we sat downstairs and discussed everyones travels with some free coffee. Only heading back up  for a little while to get close ups of the waterfall and to lean back over the side to really appriciate the height. 

As we departed our two hour boat ride us lucky backpackers were offered free left over sandwiches and cakes, good job I didn't pay for the lunch! We jumped back on the bus and was soon whizzing back along the windy mountainous road! We didn't stop much on the way back, it was getting dark and we had a long trip. We had one last treat before our journey was over, we watched a classic Kiwi film called "the fastest Indian" or something like that. It was a great film about an old man who wanted to drive his old Indian motorbike the fastest. It's a true story and I believe he still holds the record. 

We arrived back late into Queenstown, and I rushed back to the hostel to tell Hana all bout my day and find out about hers. She was being super efficient and was cooking us some dinner, we gave each other a hug and was glad to back together. She had spent the day walking the gardens and got hit by some freebies, only to realise it was her fault she was on the freesbie golf course. She was gutted I wasn't there to play. She did some important Internet things and chilled with people in the hostel, I believe she had a great day learning to chill and do nothing. 

We stayed in that night and just talked and talked until we went to sleep, we were leaving in the morning early and I had had a long day so needed my beauty sleep. 

Could of spent more time in Queenstown but it is always better to leave wanting more than to leave sick of the place.