Monday, April 25th:
We woke up at 7:15 a.m. to a beautiful view of the sun shining over Lake Ohau. It was amazing getting ready in the morning with the doors wide open and smelling the freshness of the morning. I would love to wake up every morning, open the doors of my room, and have the view of a glacier lake! We had breakfast at the hotel, and then got in the bus to drive to Queenstown! Along the way, there were so many beautiful vineyards.
Along the way to break up the drive, we stopped at Jone's Fruit Stall, which was a huge fruit shop that had so many different types of fruits and nuts. It was by far, the biggest selection of fruit I have ever seen in my life. The way everything was displayed was so neat and presentable, that everything looked so good to buy! I have never seen a store more organized.
There were many different fruits that I have seen before, but there was also a lot of different types of New Zealand fruits I had never seen. I would have bought a ton of fruit while I was there, but I did not have much room in my suitcase to carry anything else. I should have bought the ice cream pear to see if it actually tasted like ice cream!
Our tour guide told us before we entered the store that Jone's Fruit Stall is known for their freshly made ice cream with fruit added in. She said that if we do not like ice cream, we still needed to try it because it tasted so good. Even though it was only about 10 a.m., of course I had to try it! The way it works is that you pick an ice cream flavor, such as vanilla, chocolate, caramel, etc., and then pick what fruit you want to add in. All of the fruit is extremely fresh and is usually picked that morning. I decided to get vanilla ice cream with mixed berry. Let me just tell you, it was AMAZING! I have never tasted ice cream so fresh and so good in my life. The fruit in the ice cream stood out so much and all I was craving the rest of the trip was this fruit ice cream!
Along the way, since it is fall right now in New Zealand, all of the trees are changing colors and the leaves are falling off of the trees. Growing up in California, we never get to see any of this happen, which is why I love fall time in Boulder. The trees in Boulder change color and the leaves fall off the trees just like I saw in New Zealand! It made me miss Boulder a lot!
We got back in the bus after eating our ice cream, and drove the rest of the way to Queenstown and arrived at 12 p.m.. The entire drive took about 3 hours, but when we arrived, I realized why they call it Queenstown. By far, Queenstown was my favorite place we went to the entire trip. Our tour guide told us that they call the town Queenstown because it is so beautiful it is fit for a Queen. The population of the town is only 15,000 people, but during the winter time it triples to about 45,000 people. People from all over the world come to this town during the winter to work at the ski lodges and enjoy this amazing town in New Zealand for a couple of months.
When we arrived at our hotel, the tour guide told us that we got upgraded to a really nice hotel. I was expecting a hotel that was a little nicer than a hostel, but not super nice. Boy, was I wrong! If I had to guess, I would say we were staying at a 4 star hotel. Every single room at the hotel had a view of Lake Wakatipu. 15,000 years ago during the last ice age, a huge glacier moving from the north west carved out what is now Lake Wakatipu. The lake is relatively thin, but the mountains run straight into the lake, forming a deep canyon. Lake Wakatipu is the second largest lake in the South Island, covering over 290 square km. The view from our rooms and the hotel was absolutely beautiful, and a view I will remember for the rest of my life. When we arrived, the 7 of us walked around the hotel and took pictures of the view.
The was the dining room we ate at every morning with a view of the lake:
The view from our rooms and the hotel:
Panoramic View of Lake Wakatipu:
In the afternoon, we went to the town which reminded me of a ski village like Vail. The town had a ton of different ski shops. We got lunch, and then went and paid for all of the activities that we were going to do that week. Here are a few pictures of what the town looked like:
That night, the entire tour group went to a pub for dinner, and then we went out to two different bars together. One of the bars had bubble wrap on the tables and bar so that people could dance on top of them! It was so much fun!
That is it for now, since I have a paper I need to write by Friday. I will update the blog again tomorrow, telling you about our trip to Milford Sound!
Heaps of Love,
Heidi
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