Day Tours

Alright, now that I've found a reliable computer I can tell you what we've been doing the last few days! Our first day in Queenstown was rainy, but we spent it looking around and figuring out what we were going to do over the next couple of days. We also had to move hostels because the first one was a bit sketchy. We stayed at Deco Backpackers, which ended up being very nice and quiet with a fabulous garden area that overlooked Lake Wakitipu (I'm not sure about that spelling).

Tuesday, we took an all day tour to Milford Sound. We caught the bus at about 8am and didn't return until about 8:30pm. We took our time getting to the Milford Sound and stopped at a number of places along the way to take little walks, check out the view or get snacks. Our cruise started at 2pm and lasted about 2 hours. It had rained the day before so there were a lot more waterfalls than usual, but it was still cloudy so we didn't get to see the top of Mitre Peak. There was a lot of sitting on that trip, but we're glad we got to see the fabulous scenery!

Pictures of the trip to Milford Sounds:

http://asu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2271951&l=e6d19&id=10001326

On Wednesday we took our time getting up and went and had coffee while we marveled at how absolutely beautiful the day was! At 12:30 the little shuttle van picked us up at our hostel and we left for the best wine tour I've ever done! The weather couldn't have been better and we had a small group of about 7 on our tour so everything was very personalized. We went to four wineries: Gibston Valley, Waitiri Creek, The Winehouse & Kitchen and Amisfield. We tasted a TON of wines, especially Pinot Noirs, Pinot Gris and other whites. The Central Otago region of the South Island is known for it's Pinot Noirs, so you can guess what was the best! Beate bought a bottle of what's called Pinot Blanc (which is made from the Pinot Noir grape) at Gibston Valley and I bought a bottle of Pinot Noir from The Winehouse & Kitchen. They had 3 different labels there, but the one I bought is the Van Ash label. Then we bought a half bottle of the pinot noir from Amisfield...it is amazing! We had such a great time and definitely thought the trip was worth our money! We got back to the hostel just after 5 and decided to sit outside and enjoy some sun for awhile. We were planning on going out that night but then I got hit with the worst allergies I've had since being in NZ! I'm still fighting them too!

Pictures of the Wine Trail Tour:

http://asu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2272516&l=18247&id=10001326

Thursday we had a lazy day since neither of us slept much the night before. We rode the gondola up to the top of the mountain behind Queenstown and took pictures of the spectacular view. Then we spent most of the day reading and hanging out. We cooked dinner that night since it was our last night with Dennis. The next morning was early since we had to catch the bus to Dunedin. We arrived yesterday at about 12:30pm and checked into our grundgy backpackers called "Penny's". We took the Speight's Brewery tour yesterday since we heard so much about it, and it ended up being pretty cool and very thorough! We tried to find a fun scene last night, but didn't really succeed. Today we're just checking out some more of the city before we move on to Christchurch tomorrow. Dunedin is a bit weird to be honest. It used to be the biggest city on the South Island but now it just feels like nobody really cares about it anymore and they just let it go. Needless to say, we're totally fine with leaving early tomorrow morning.

Here are the pictures of Queenstown:

http://asu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2272526&l=18d67&id=10001326