It was an early start to today’s journey. We left the Treetops Lodge at 5:00 in a steady rain. We wanted to allow a little extra time to get to Auckland in time for our 10:15 flight to Queenstown. We received a route recommendation from the staff at the lodge that turned out to be a big improvement over the route we took on the way down.

We had some flight challenges today. They warned us that there were cloud cover issues in Queenstown prior to take-off but midway through the flight the update stated that conditions were improving. We even started our decent. Unfortunately, just prior to our final approach the clouds thickened and we had to divert to Invercargill. This meant that instead of arriving in Queenstown just after noon we arrived in Invercargill around 1:00 and then boarded busses for the two and a quarter hour drive to Queenstown. It was a pretty nice ride once we got away from the airport. The route was dominated by farms early on. Mostly sheep but some cows and even some deer.

As we drew closer we drove along Lake Wakatipu which is New Zealand’s largest lake.

We picked up a rental car when we arrived at the airport and drove to our hotel After checking in we had just enough time to take the gondola, the steepest in the southern hemisphere, to the top of the mountain where we took a number of beautiful photographs.

On our second day in Queenstown, we arranged for a private tour of the Central Otago region which is home to nearly 60 wineries. Along the way we stopped to take some photos of the beautiful mountain ranges including areas where parts of the Lord of the Rings movies were filmed.

Our first winery stop was the Whinehouse which was located next to one of the many bungee jump locations. In case you didn’t know, bungee was invented in New Zealand by two guys, A.J. Hackett and Henry Van Asch. Speaking of Kiwi inventions, they also invented jet boating which we also saw today. We also learned that there was a major gold rush here, second only the the rust that occurred in California. In addition to stopping at wineries such as Mt. Difficulty, where we had a delicious lunch, Peregrine and Amisfield we stopped at The Wine Experience. At the experience they offer a hands-on exhibit focusing upon the importance role smell plays with wine. In one room were the essences of a scents that exist within the wines of the region. Following that was a video showing a number of wineries in the valley as well as interviews with vineyard owners and winemakers. Did you know that Sam Neill the actor made wine? He makes wine at a vineyard called Two Paddocks in the Central Otago region. Oh yeah. We got to taste some wine too.

Our next day in Queenstown was a very busy one. We were picked up at our hotel and driven to the airport where we boarded a helicopter. Our ‘copter tour was to take us to glacier-carved Milford Sound. It was amazing! After we departed the airport we flew over peaks surrounding Queenstown. We continued over the alps and then came our biggest surprise. We landed on a plateau at the top of one of the peaks. OMG.

As we were exiting the helicopter, our pilot instructed us to stay in the front of the machine because there were dangerous crevasses to the rear. He didn’t have t tell us that twice. The views were amazing!

Our next stop was a little warmer. We landed on a rocky beach near the mouth of Milford Sound. In addition to more lovely scenery we were treated to a special site – a pod of dolphins swam by as we were taking pictures.

Our final stop was Milford Sound for more incredible views.

As if we hadn’t had enough adventure for one day, we decided to head up the river to one of the many bungee jumping sites. This one is on the Kawarau bridge. Mark figured that if he was ever going to do it, this was the place since the Kawarau River Bungy was the first commercial bungee site in the world. After checking it out I decided to give it a shot. I learned quickly that 142 feet didn’t seem as high looking from the observation deck. I think shuffling out to the end of the platform was the worst part…that and the distance to the water.

More photos from the Queenstown area are available here. We strongly recommend checking them out.