and where the gold rush enthusiasts arrived. There are many Victorian buildings, a cathedral and churches and it is a nice town for a stroll around.
One building in particular even has the tour buses pulling up for everyone to pile inside and that is the fine railway station, which I am sure even Michael Portillo would be impressed with. The inside is all decoratively tiled, there are stained glass windows and the exterior very grand. Steve was particularly impressed to see an enormous 4-8-2 steam locomotive on display, the last steam engine built in New Zealand.
Our reason for visiting this area was to explore the Otago Peninsular, a stunning landscape with coastal wildlife and super walks. The roads were very steep and winding in parts and the coastal route frightened me when I drove as I was on the water side with no barrier and no edge to speak of; I just gripped the steering wheel and concentrated on keeping the car on the road around the twisting bends. Our afternoon trekking began round the steep cliffs passing an enormously deep chasm and a collapsed sea cave leaving just a bridge called 'Lovers Leap' with a bright and blustery viewpoint.
We continued to climb up through rough scrubland to find our signpost to Sandfly Bay, our destination. Luckily for us there were no sand flies around today as they can be nasty little critters.
From here we descended down the biggest and steepest sand dunes I have ever encountered, which was great fun and so nice with no impact on our knees. We were also walking into an incredibly strong onshore breeze, and wondering how on earth we were going to get back up again even with the wind behind us.
The bay and beach were beautiful and wild, and we were rewarded with lots of fur seals sleeping or just chilling on the shoreline rocks and a massive Hooker's seal lion exhausted on the sand. Returning later was quite an experience and took us 40 minutes just to reach the top of the first giant sand dune before heading back through the bushy footpath to retrieve our car. We continued to explore different parts of the peninsular through the early evening as we were remaining here until our evening penguin outing. We were booked on a 9pm viewing experience at the Royal Albatross Centre right at the tip of the peninsular to see the smallest penguin in the world, the Little Blue Penguin, only about 32cm tall. Gathering with fellow tourists from all over the world at the viewing platform on the waters edge we waited in a huddle in the cold evening air. It was a clear night and the stars above were so vivid as we were miles away from any street lighting.
Soon we were rewarded with a marvellous sight of rafts (I learnt this term from the rangers) of the cutest little blue penguins emerging from the sea and scuttling up the hillside to locate their nests and their chicks ready for the evening feed. I was so thrilled to be witnessing this and they continued to keep arriving for about half an hour.
Crossing now back over to the west of South Island we left Dunedin for Queenstown, a winter ski resort and summer adrenaline-junkie-extreme-activity kind of place full of bungy jumping, paragliding, jet boats and numerous other exciting opportunities. Our route took us past sheep country, through wide river valleys full of fruit farms and orchards (where we stocked up on local, seasonal fresh produce) and through real Wild West terrain of brown dry rocky hillsides with deep narrow river gorges. We stopped off at a bungy jumping location en route, just outside Queenstown, to watch; I wished I was brave enough to have a try. We were soon joined on the viewing platform by a coach group of elderly Americans arriving to cheer on one of their party - well in to his seventies - who was keen to hurl himself off the bridge spanning a river below. We were very impressed he did it! He can just about be seen below the bridge.
Queenstown has the most spectacular location, bordering Lake Wakatipu and surrounded by hills and mountains, which looked idyllic from our bedroom in the afternoon sunshine and even better on our reconnaissance stroll; there was even a perfect looking tennis club in the middle of the park.
It was roasting hot so sitting on the lakeside beach with an ice cream and groups of young backpackers seemed the ideal thing to do. So far we have been touring around but being here felt like we were back on holiday again.
Whilst here we decided to get busy and do what the locals do so we hired mountain bikes for the morning and headed out on a recommended lakeside off-road trail. The air was still, cool and fresh being this high up in and the sky was a perfect blue, ideal cycling conditions.
We had spotted a new sport to try in the park called 'disc golf' which is a bit like golf in that you have 18 'holes' each with a set par and count the number of throws taken to get your frisbee into a cage-like contraption for each one. The challenge is greatly increased by the fact that the course runs through a pine forest and there are people around to avoid too. Undeterred we purchased our frisbees and had a great time, meeting lots of lovely people on the way round - and a rather nerdy group of professional disc golfers taking it all very seriously with bags full of differing frisbees - and definitely improving as we went.
A jet boat ride seemed to be an appropriate activity for us, as we were looking for a bit of a thrill without needing to be too courageous. The hour long trip was great as we sped along the lake in the capable hands of Andre our driver, doing 360 degree spins at high speed and shooting down a river swerving to narrowly miss rocks, trees and the banks.
We are having a mix of self catering and dining out on our tour and in Queenstown we had a delicious supper at a restaurant, cooking our meat (venison and beef fillet) at the table on hot stones, gazing out across the lake on an upstairs terrace as the sun went down behind the mountain ranges. Strolling to walk off our dinner we both wished we were twenty again, seeing the beach front area packed full of young people from all over the world, sitting in groups and having a beer or two.
From one 'Lord of the Rings' actual film location spot to another we arrived in Wanaka today, a ski resort in the winter and a hikers paradise in the summer, home to many popular long distance treks. Lake Wanaka is the 4th largest lake in NZ and this area is a national park, with views to swoon over.
Looking for new opportunities to broaden our horizons we embarked on a 10km hike up to the Rob Roy Glacier, described in one book as among the finest half day walks in NZ. The drive to Raspberry Creek car park (love the name) provided us with amazing views on all sides but better was to come. The walk comprised a swing bridge, alpine woodland footpaths
and an upland stream crashing noisily below us until the path dropped down and we could sit on the rocks and look upwards to see the glacier in the distance;
the ice a dazzling white in the bright sunshine. Once at the top of our track we had an awe-inspiring view of the glacier and mountains and despite hearing some loud booms we didn't actually see any avalanches.
A wonderful walk and the trek back down was just as picturesque. Just when we thought the landscape couldn't get any better our motel landlady informed us that our route tomorrow through a mountain pass and on up the west coast to Fox Glacier is one of the best drives around these parts. My poor little iphone camera is going to get worn out...
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