Tuesday, May 03, 2005
Queenstown
Kia Ora
This will be the last blog from NZ as I hope to do the next one at Fiona's. Thanks Sam for the e-mail---glad you had a good time in Cawdor. Can't reply personally as you sent an anon blog!!!!!!!!!! Much love from Gran & Grandpa Sorry Dad has had to go back to work.
We had another wonderful journey to Queenstown from Fox. Before we left the sun was shining and we did the Lake Matheson walk--no reflections but great view of Mts Tasman and Cook. The West Coast drive was great with an impressive view of where the Tasman Sea and Antarctic Ocean meet. From Haast we turned inland to follow the Haast R valley--another impressive steep sided forested valley with a broad braided river bed this time. Once over the pass we were in different country--grassland because of the rainshadow Brilliant sunshine as we followed Lakes Wanaka and Hawea to Wanaka where there is a Puzzle Store which sounded interesting. At our coffee stop we took in the Wanaka Festival of Colours (gala) and Pat enjoyed a display of dancing by teenagers. There is also one of the best skateboard parks I've seen made of concrete and sunk into the ground. We took a backroad to Arrowtown via Cardrona ( a ski not a golf resort!)--there were spectacular views to Arrowtown and Queenstown with para gliders taking off from the hillside.
Arrowtown was fully booked as its Festival was in full swing so we got fixed up in Queenstown. On Sunday we went out to Arrowtown and went to the open air service--held in brilliant sunshine. The music was provided by the Arrowtown Miners Band--a wonderful collection of local worthies who played on the back of an old lorry and at the same tempo for all tunes! "Roll out the Barrel" was one of their entroit pieces! Arrowtown is a very quaint former gold mining settlement which looks very New England with the deciduous trees changing colour. Chinese were brought over to mine the gold at the end of the 19th C and didn't get a very good deal--the Govt apologised in 2002. It was a very relaxing day.
On Monday we left Queenstown at 6.30 am and drove the first hour in the dark--our mission was to get to Manapouri and join a trip to Doubtful Sound. The 2 hour drive was completed in rain but it had stopped by the time we did the boat crossing of L Manapouri although it was dark and cloudy. After our visit to an HEP station--2 km drive underground-- the sun came out and the drive over the Wilmot Pass gave a wonderful first glimpse of the Sound--so called as Capt Cook doubted he could get in and out because of a series of little islands and rocks at the mouth. We had a 3 hour cruise up the Sound and nearly reached the mouth--it is 3 times the length of Milford. The weather was glorious and we spent the time on the deck at the front of the catamaran--there were only 14 in the company--the maximum allowed so we had individual treatment as there were 2 guides on board. As well as numerous waterfalls--only 4 are permanent in an area with 8 m of rain a year--we saw blue penguins, fur seals and hump backed dolphins. It was a magic day (another one!)
Today I did the mandatory Shotover Jet Boat trip--very exciting nearly crashing into the sides of the gorge and doing 360 turns at speed--how these guys never have an accident I don't know. The boats go up to 86 km per hr and can operate in 10 cms of water. It is very expensive and very commercial--I declined the photo package at 15 GDP In the afternoon we drove out to Glenorchy which is a magical spot at the end of L Wakatipu where Andrew Aitken, son of one of my school buddies has built a house--we saw it but Andrew wasn't in. This was another Lord of the Rings location. Before dark we had a great shoreline walk in Queenstown.
The weather has been unbelievable--sun again today and snow on the hills It looks as if it will continue. There were 2 tremors last night at 3 am! We head for Christchurch tomorrow and are staying with the brother of our Lochmaben hairdresser whom I taught! It is hard to believe we've been here nearly 3 weeks and hardly seen rain. It is cooler tonight but it is late autumn!
Hope the election goes well, Michael--will get the results no doubt here.
Best wishes
Tom
This will be the last blog from NZ as I hope to do the next one at Fiona's. Thanks Sam for the e-mail---glad you had a good time in Cawdor. Can't reply personally as you sent an anon blog!!!!!!!!!! Much love from Gran & Grandpa Sorry Dad has had to go back to work.
We had another wonderful journey to Queenstown from Fox. Before we left the sun was shining and we did the Lake Matheson walk--no reflections but great view of Mts Tasman and Cook. The West Coast drive was great with an impressive view of where the Tasman Sea and Antarctic Ocean meet. From Haast we turned inland to follow the Haast R valley--another impressive steep sided forested valley with a broad braided river bed this time. Once over the pass we were in different country--grassland because of the rainshadow Brilliant sunshine as we followed Lakes Wanaka and Hawea to Wanaka where there is a Puzzle Store which sounded interesting. At our coffee stop we took in the Wanaka Festival of Colours (gala) and Pat enjoyed a display of dancing by teenagers. There is also one of the best skateboard parks I've seen made of concrete and sunk into the ground. We took a backroad to Arrowtown via Cardrona ( a ski not a golf resort!)--there were spectacular views to Arrowtown and Queenstown with para gliders taking off from the hillside.
Arrowtown was fully booked as its Festival was in full swing so we got fixed up in Queenstown. On Sunday we went out to Arrowtown and went to the open air service--held in brilliant sunshine. The music was provided by the Arrowtown Miners Band--a wonderful collection of local worthies who played on the back of an old lorry and at the same tempo for all tunes! "Roll out the Barrel" was one of their entroit pieces! Arrowtown is a very quaint former gold mining settlement which looks very New England with the deciduous trees changing colour. Chinese were brought over to mine the gold at the end of the 19th C and didn't get a very good deal--the Govt apologised in 2002. It was a very relaxing day.
On Monday we left Queenstown at 6.30 am and drove the first hour in the dark--our mission was to get to Manapouri and join a trip to Doubtful Sound. The 2 hour drive was completed in rain but it had stopped by the time we did the boat crossing of L Manapouri although it was dark and cloudy. After our visit to an HEP station--2 km drive underground-- the sun came out and the drive over the Wilmot Pass gave a wonderful first glimpse of the Sound--so called as Capt Cook doubted he could get in and out because of a series of little islands and rocks at the mouth. We had a 3 hour cruise up the Sound and nearly reached the mouth--it is 3 times the length of Milford. The weather was glorious and we spent the time on the deck at the front of the catamaran--there were only 14 in the company--the maximum allowed so we had individual treatment as there were 2 guides on board. As well as numerous waterfalls--only 4 are permanent in an area with 8 m of rain a year--we saw blue penguins, fur seals and hump backed dolphins. It was a magic day (another one!)
Today I did the mandatory Shotover Jet Boat trip--very exciting nearly crashing into the sides of the gorge and doing 360 turns at speed--how these guys never have an accident I don't know. The boats go up to 86 km per hr and can operate in 10 cms of water. It is very expensive and very commercial--I declined the photo package at 15 GDP In the afternoon we drove out to Glenorchy which is a magical spot at the end of L Wakatipu where Andrew Aitken, son of one of my school buddies has built a house--we saw it but Andrew wasn't in. This was another Lord of the Rings location. Before dark we had a great shoreline walk in Queenstown.
The weather has been unbelievable--sun again today and snow on the hills It looks as if it will continue. There were 2 tremors last night at 3 am! We head for Christchurch tomorrow and are staying with the brother of our Lochmaben hairdresser whom I taught! It is hard to believe we've been here nearly 3 weeks and hardly seen rain. It is cooler tonight but it is late autumn!
Hope the election goes well, Michael--will get the results no doubt here.
Best wishes
Tom
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Mum,Dad,
Pleased to hear that you are still having fun. Catherine said that mum had a bad back, so I hope that is better.
I did reply to your last email, but I assume you did not get that because you were using someone else's account. Dad, you can check your email using http://www.mail2web.com
Click on the "Advanced Log In" link and then fill in your details. The mail server is mail.onetel.net, and you know the user name and password for your onetel internet service. Click the "Check mail" button after completing the form. After you have logged in, you can read your email, send new messages and delete any messages that you don't want to keep. Remember to log out after you finish.
I would suggest that you take a look occasionally; I just checked to make sure the login works, and you had 107 outstanding messages. Without reading your email, and working from the message titles, I have deleted the obvious spam. Hope this is OK and you do not require multiple supplies of Viagra and invitations to join dodgy Nigerian financial schemes.
Take care
Ken
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Pleased to hear that you are still having fun. Catherine said that mum had a bad back, so I hope that is better.
I did reply to your last email, but I assume you did not get that because you were using someone else's account. Dad, you can check your email using http://www.mail2web.com
Click on the "Advanced Log In" link and then fill in your details. The mail server is mail.onetel.net, and you know the user name and password for your onetel internet service. Click the "Check mail" button after completing the form. After you have logged in, you can read your email, send new messages and delete any messages that you don't want to keep. Remember to log out after you finish.
I would suggest that you take a look occasionally; I just checked to make sure the login works, and you had 107 outstanding messages. Without reading your email, and working from the message titles, I have deleted the obvious spam. Hope this is OK and you do not require multiple supplies of Viagra and invitations to join dodgy Nigerian financial schemes.
Take care
Ken
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: 10:50 pm
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