Queenstown

Day 1 – Horror House

Waking fairly early because we had to take the hire car back, we had a coffee out on the balcony looking at the wonderful view before dropping into the town.

We dropped the car off at the office that was in the centre of town which was handy and then checked out the mad adrenaline sports you could book with an agency that was next door.  The one thing we wanted to do, which had be recommended to us by Guy and Tyler, a couple we had met in Fiji, was the AJ Hackets Bungy Swing.  Unfortunately there were no discounts and deals on this so we only really could afford swing and nothing else.

Booking sorted for the next day we then walked around town with a vague brief of trying to find Shell some long-johns to replace the ones lost in The Himalaya’s, as we were due to go to the Patagonian part of Chile in a few day time.

After hunting round for a bit and finding the cheapest pair for about £20 we decided we had four more days to see if we could find cheaper and so gave up shopping and headed for a lakeside pub.

The view of the lake and the mountains from the pub was great so we stayed there for an hour or two longer than planned, practicing our Spanish and just chatting.

By the time we both felt the gumption to leave and head for home we were a bit tipsy. As we headed back we passed what was billed as New Zealand’s most scary walk through Horror House that we had looked at earlier.  Normally I really don’t like these things, but with the alcohol in my system and the feeling we had not done much today we decided to give it a whirl.

On entering and paying quite an expensive entrance fee we were then briefed on what to do which was follow the LED lights, don’t punch anything and to shout ‘Chicken’ if you wanted to be pulled out early (we were told quite a few people did this).

When the lights to a nearby door flickered it was our turn to enter, luckily for me Shell was instructed to go in front whilst I followed holding on to her shoulders.  We then found ourselves in pitch darkness with only small glowing lights to follow (and Shell feeling her way along the walls).  It wasn’t too long before some Zombie was suddenly screaming in Shell’s face causing us to jump and scream (well Shell said I screamed??).

As we stumbled around in the dark (apparently with me back seat driving), things were grabbing at us, rattling cage chains and screaming at us and basically doing everything to make us need a change of underwear.  Towards the end we found ourselves in a bit of a dead end when someone hissed at us ‘GO BACK’ which again made us jump.

A couple more spooks later and we found ourselves back in the reception area, pretty pleased that we hadn’t had to shout ‘Chicken’, although it was pretty good and fun it wasn’t worth what we paid for it and no, we didn’t purchase the obligatory photo’s so here’s a homemade snap of our own.

On our way back to our room we stopped by the reception as Shell wanted to complain about the lack of a sofa in our room (as per the picture when we booked).  Although the receptionist could not sort this out she did manage to get us a very large bean-bag from the common room and some extra cushion, which was better than nothing.

Once back at the room I then cooked up my now famous and over-used Chile Con Carne to try and use up the spices we had left in our mobile larder.  Whilst we waiting for the Chile to boil down we relaxed on our new bean-bag.

After having dinner and having a bottle or two of wine we felt too settled to be bothered going out to check out what the nightlife had to offer (plus we had rinsed our budget on the bungee trip), so just spent a quiet night in until we went to bed.

Day 2 – Don’t Look Down!!

Managing to get a bit of a lie-in for a change we had a late breakfast, which was a nice English fry up, care of the electric fryer we had bought (we are finally making use of it after 2 weeks of sitting in the boot of the car).

Heading out a bit later we made our way down to the offices where we were due  to be picked up for the bungy swing.  We were checked in, then weighed and had our hands marked (for identification purposes later???) and then asked to wait on some bean-bags whilst we watched video’s of various bungy activities on the screens.

Soon though we were called to board a coach to take us to the bungy site which was about 40 minutes away.  Along the way we passed the first bungy jump bridge in NZ which had been running now 42 year, however the drop for this was about a third of the height we were heading for!!

At the jump site there was another office where we checked in  and once again were weighed (not sure how much you can put on in a 40 minute bus ride) and another number was scribbled on our hands and then we were told to head over the bridge to the jumping station. The wind was really picking up now so they moved us along quickly before the ride had to be shut.

Due to the wind,  the suspended bridge to the suspended jumping platform was a pretty wobbly but we managed to get across without to many nerves showing.

Once at the jumping platform we had a chance to watch a couple do the tandem drop that we were about to do shortly, suddenly being dropped about 80 metres before turning into a massive rope swing across the valley below.  A big scream and then they were gone!!

We thought we would have to wait for a while whilst we watched some more people who were standing around do it.  However these people were mostly spectators and we were called up to get our harnesses fitted as we were up next!!

After we had been fitted into our harnesses we were then secured by a rope into the jump zone. 

We were then strapped into the bungy harness/seat and winched out over the drop with our body’s dangling above the valley below.  Being honest I was very calm about this after doing our skydive, I was pretty sure Shell wasn’t worried about it either.

The guy running the show told us to look to one side, for the obligatory photo shot and then asked me hold my go-pro out to one side (so it didn’t hit us in the face when we dropped).  Finally he told us to look up for another photo opportunity, during which he caught us by surprise and just hit the red button!!

We dropped like a stone and the feeling was far worse than when we did our sky dive a week earlier, you can see from the photo how much Shell was enjoying it.  Shell let out a big scream, but on playing back my video footage we did detect a little yelp by me followed by an expletive!

Once the drop hit the swing part of the experience I think that Shell finally opened her eyes again and we were both laughing (in relief??) as we could just enjoy the swing over the valley and the river below.

Soon we stopped swinging and then were hoisted back to the jump platform, I think we would both rather jump out of a plane again than do another bungy swing!!

We stuck around for a bit to watch some other people do it so we could appreciate their nerves and drop screams before they had to close the jump due to the wind. We headed back over the bridge to the office. At the office we checked out our photo’s and video footage they took whilst we waited for the bus to take us into town.  After checking what video I took on my go-pro we were amazed to see that it was pretty good, which meant we only bought our photos which saved us money on buying their video.

The coach dropped us back in town and then we walked back up that steep hill to our room, where we once again turned on our Spanish Lesson audio book to try and cram some more vocabulary into us before we hit Chile.

Once again the evening was spent preparing dinner, trying to use up the remaining food we had, having a few drinks and relaxing before bed.

Day 3 – Wash Out!!

Awakening to the sound of hammering on our roof we peered outside and discover that it was actually rain and it was absolutely chucking it down, which put paid to our plan of doing a luge trip down the nearby mountain.

Once we had another nice home-cooked breakfast we realised that the rain was not going to ease up so we settled down to some blogging, research on Chile (it looks like it’s gonna be expensive!) and yet further Spanish lessons.

As it turned out the rain did not let up all day so most of the day was spent as above before we cooked our evening meal, a last chance for our lamb chop & salad special.

The rain did not let up in the evening either so we resigned ourselves to staying in and just had a few drinks, watched TV and went to bed.

Day 4 – Luging and Final Day in NZ

It was a big surprise given the rain the previous day when Shell (getting up first as usual) declared that it was snowing outside.  Once I dragged myself out of the crawl space and down the ladder I then saw for myself that there was an inch or so covering on all the roof’s below and even greater coverage on the surrounding mountains, which made for a pretty photo.

Another home cooked breakfast later and the sun was out and the snow was melting quickly, so we thought we would see if the luge thing was working so we headed down the road to the cable car station.

At the station they had various offers so we decided on the cable car and two luge rides each, we figured a couple of goes would be enough and also cheaper. 

We caught the cable car to the top of the mountain admiring the view along the way and soon we were getting off at the top.  There was quite a large complex at the top and they had a viewing platform/balcony where you had a magnificent view over the whole of Queenstown, the lake below and all the snow-filled mountains in the area.

A few photo’s later we then headed to place for the luge ride and we grabbed a helmet before boarding a chair lift to take us to the top of the mountain where the luge station was.

The luge’s are basically un-motorised go-carts (not the ice toboggan things) and you go on a downhill track that winds you round sharp bends to the bottom where you can pick up the chair lift again.

After Shell and I climbed aboard our mean machines we were given a brief tutorial, push forward on handles = go, pull back on handles = stop, left & Right…Simples.  Soon we were off on the blue run (slow track) and we were getting used to the steering and enjoying the increasing speed as you went down.  Although I nearly lost it on a corner as I found it’s impossible to try and take photo’s on one of these things and steer at the same time! (My excuse anyway).  It was pretty good fun trying to race each other and overtake on the bends.

Once at the bottom we quickly jumped back on the chair-lift to take us back up for our second turn.  On the second run we both agreed to do the Red Run (much steeper & Faster), however as I was trying to get a picture of Shell on the start line she got a head start on me.  In my eagerness to catch her up I got my start & stop muddled so I was well behind her, she was out of sight.  The track was a lot faster and a lot more fun, so I hammered after Shell only to get in touching distance of her as she crossed the finishing line.  Being honest it was a lot of fun and we could have done with another go!!

Before we got the cable-car back down the mountain we had noticed from the viewing platform that there was a bungy jumping centre operating just below, so we thought we would go and watch that for a while.  It was fun watching a couple of guys launch themselves off the platform and hearing their relief as the bungy rope recoiled at the bottom.

Back at the bottom of the mountain we then headed back into town to do some shopping, picking up some essential bathroom stuff before grabbing Shell’s new long-johns.

We then went to the pub by the lake for a couple of beers before going home for the day.  During the late afternoon and evening we tried to finish off all our remaining food and drink as we were saying goodbye to NZ tomorrow and heading for a new continent.