Mount Cook & Sontsa's B-day

So, it was the Friday before last that Sontsa, John, Arash & I roadtripped it to Mount Cook. It also happened to be Sontsa’s 22nd birthday! I tried my best to secretly buy her a birthday card early that morning, but not a single store in Oamaru was open before 9:00 am, which was of no help to me since I still had to get ready & packed before the 10:00 am checkout time. Nonetheless, birthday celebrations were in order for that night. It took us about 3 hours to drive to Mount Cook. On the way, we stopped off at a town called Twizel, as I had heard from someone that it was a cool spot. Yeahhh...I'm not too sure who told me that, but I'd have to just go ahead & strongly disagree with them haha. We drove through the entire town in matter of 3 minutes & trust me, it was nothing special. It did made for a bit of a laugh though. The other views along the way to Mount Cook were really nice---we drove past some huge gorgeous lakes that were bright turquoise green, then eventually saw some snow-covered mountains. Upon our arrival to Mount Cook, we went to the I-site.

However, this particular I-site was unlike any other that I've seen before; it was like a historical museum! It had cool exhibits, sweet artwork and impressive architecture, plus really interesting historical facts about Mount Cook and the people who have climbed it,  and it even had a small movie theatre with a neat video on Mount Cook. After exploring the I-site for a little while, we finally made our way outside to actually go take a look at Mount Cook itself. We saw numerous gorgeous mountains around us, but as it turned out, none of them were Mount Cook. We found out there were different access points that you could either drive or walk to in order to get solid views of Mount Cook & the surrounding glaciers. We chose to drive toward the Tasman Glacier. Even though it was only a few minutes drive away from the I-site, the views when we got to the parking lot near the Tasman Glacier were sooo much more noteworthy. Little did we know, it was to get even better from there. We took a zig-zaggy walking trail up some relatively unsturdy rocks toward the viewing point for Tasman Glacier.

I can honestly say that when we got to the top, we were in no way prepared for the unbelievable views that would be surrounding us; we were all completely taken aback & just stood there in awe. Every direction you looked, there was 360 degrees of scenery that simply took your breath away. Pictures just cannot do it justice, not even close. We all sat there for a good 20-30 minutes in the crisp mountain air staring at the snow-topped mountains (including Mount Cook), the mostly-melted glacier, and the green mountains in the distance. It was one of those moments where you could not fully fathom the beauty that you were experiencing. If it hadn't been for the sun starting to go down, we would have stayed much longer. As it was though, we had to get back down the rocky trail before dark. The original plan was to stay in Mount Cook for the night before going to Lake Tekapo the next day, but we had learned at the I-site earlier that the hostels were really expensive in Mount Cook. Therefore, we all decided to go ahead & go to Lake Tekapo a day early. It was about an hour & a half drive away, so it was just after 7:00 pm by the time we got to what we thought was the only hostel in town.

Unfortunately, when we went to the hostel reception window, we found out they'd closed just 5 minutes prior...oops. We hadn't pre-booked anything, so once again poor planning was problematic. A note was posted on a board next to the reception window though saying that the owners lived across the street & could be contacted in case of an emergency. Arash considered our dilemma an emergency, and he was supported by a girl who was staying at the hostel. She told us, "Oh yeah, just go over. They seriously just left, so they won't mind." Yeahhh...they were wrong. Arash had volunteered to be the one to go to the house. He had apparently interrupted the lady whilst cooking, she was quite angry, stomped her way back over to the hostel across the street, then told Arash that she could book us all into a dorm room, but we'd have to be very quiet all evening because there were some older people staying in the hostel & she'd promised them a quiet night.

When Arash came back to the car & told us about her 'offer,' we weren't exactly thrilled and decided to try to find alternative accommodation. Arash went back to her & said we came to a group decision that we would not be staying there due to the 'minimal noise requirement.' Haha. I'm sure that didn't ease her anger much, but I mean, it was Sontsa's birthday for crying out loud! Next stop was a small hotel in town. Of course, hotels are generally more expensive.  The boys therefore went inside to do some sweet talking to the woman receptionist to try to get us a deal; it worked. The only downfall was that a hotel room wouldn't have a kitchen & Arash wanted to do a nice birthday dinner (The fact that it wouldn't have a kitchen didn't even cross mine & Sontsa's minds since we don't exactly do any cooking haha).

However, the hotel receptionist also told the boys about some other hostels that were in the area. We went to one that she'd mentioned & it was a success! The four of us even got our own dorm room, so that was perfect. Arash immediately started cooking up a storm: slow-cooked chicken, fluffy rice, and seasoned vegetables with spices & herbs. When he served us our delicous-looking plates, he said, "Oh, and make sure you don't eat the bay leaves." That's right...the boy carries bay leaves around with him to season his food! Haha..love it. He actually carried around an entire bag filled with about 10-15 different spices, herbs & seasonings. As expected, the meal was exquisite! We all had such a fun night celebrating Sontsa's birthday, chatting, having lots of laughs, and even doing some star-gazing in the courtyard of the hostel. The Lake Tekapo area is known for having high visibility of all the stars, so the night sky was impressively illuminated. We didn't go to sleep until very, very late the next morning. It was a day for the books!

Cheers,
Ash 

 

Moeraki & Old-Fashioned Oamaru

After almost a week, Sontsa & I left Dunedin to make our way up the east coast. On our way to Oamaru, we stopped at a tiny little place called Moeraki that had the famous Moeraki boulders on the beach. There were at least 20 massive boulders just sitting along the shoreline, many of them almost perfectly round. Pretty random, but cool. We played around on the boulders for a bit, jumping from one to the next & capturing our ballerina-like moves with Sontsa's camera =) After all that exercise, we treated ourselves to some homemade ice cream at the gift shop. Then, it was on the road again toward Oamaru. We arrived there early afternoon & were pleasantly surprised by its quaint uniqueness. We checked into the main hostel in town & really liked it--was a shame we were only there for a night. The woman who owned the hostel was awesome & she had a fluffy little chihuahua named Daisy who was adorable. After we got checked in though, we went to do some exploring. The town had such a historical look to it--really cool. We even saw a woman dressed in old-time garb with a big feather hat!

Another thing Oamaru is known for is its resident penguins! Since we didn't know exactly where we had to go to see them, we got some penguin pointers from a nice older man at the local pub. He told us that the penguins don't actually come out until after dusk, and he showed us where to stand by the harbour to see them. Oamaru actually has two different penguin species--the little blue penguin & the yellow-eyed penguin. The yellow-eyed penguins could only be seen on the other side of this big hill that would have been a 40-minute walk though. So, we opted to just see the little blue ones. Before dusk came, we passed some time sitting on the dock by the water. Then, we saw that a few people had gathered along the fenceline in front of the harbour for what we presumed to be some potential penguin viewing. Naturally, we joined. The fence even had a sign posted on it that said, "Treat Penguins With Respect." Haha. While awaiting the penguins' arrival, Sontsa & I were looking through the pictures on her camera and quietly talking to each other when a woman who was also waiting shot us an angry glare....such behavior is apparently prohibited during penguin viewing haha. Who knew? We made a consecutive decision to change our viewing location, away from the woman.

A few minutes later, two guys came up & joined our viewing spot. We ended up chatting with them for a bit--they were John & Arash from Canada. After about 30 minutes with no penguins in sight, a chilled Arash gave up & the boys left. Luckily, we were all staying at the same hostel, so we caught up with them later. Sontsa & I weathered the cold for about 15 more minutes, and I'm so glad we did! All of a sudden, waddling on the rocks directly in front of us was this tiny little blue penguin that was probably 12" tall! Sooooo adorable! It was the only one we saw, and we couldn't get any pictures since it was so dark. But it was so cute! After our successful penguin viewing, Sontsa & I went back to the hostel to put on some extra layers of clothing for exploring the town. A German girl from our room was headed to the cinema, so we ended up walking with her to the cinema & then around the city centre a bit more. Oamaru has a really beautiful Opera House that lights up with changing colors every night after 7:00 pm, so that was pretty neat. When we got back to the hostel, we spent the rest of the evening with our new Canadian friends =) I freaking love Canadians.

Arash had some crazy huge chicken dinner cooking in the oven for he & John when we got there. Turns out he is a bit of a chef at heart; the meal had taken hours to prepare! Let me just tell you that this is not something you commonly see around hostels. The guys insisted that we eat some of the food too since they had so much, and it was soooo good! They (like responsible travelers) had a rental car & were heading to Mount Cook & Lake Tekapo the next day, as were Sontsa & I. Since we were all going the same direction, the guys offered to take us with them. We were overjoyed, to say the least! Before heading out the next day, we all walked around town for a while, got some pictures of the historical-looking buildings, and went into the unique town shops (which were also like something out of the old days). We also checked out this one art studio that was advertised as "Whiskey Art." It was pretty sweet, and it had a really awesome jewelry shop attached to it too. After our exploring, we made a quick trip to the grocery store and then we were off to Mount Cook! The next couple days were some of my best in NZ!

Cheers,
Ash

Delighting in Dunedin

After saying goodbye to our awesome couchsurfing hosts Aaron, Sophie & Luke in Queenstown, and leaving them behind some Lindt chocolates and a thank you note, Sontsa & I were on our way to the east coast of the south island. Our next stop was Dunedin, the largest university town in New Zealand. We had originally planned to first go to the southern most city in the south island called Invercargill, but decided against it after about 20 people told us we'd be wasting our money. Instead, we were lucky enough to catch a ride to Dunedin with this guy Blair who was giving another backpacker we'd briefly met (Kathleen) a ride there. Blair was really nice--gave us all some tips on the hot spots to go to, etc. After Blair dropped us off in the town center, Sontsa & I found a hostel called Penny's Backpackers. We asked the older man at the reception what the cheapest dorm rooms were that he had available. He responded with a sly grin and said, "Well, I do have a very small room that just has one double-bunk in it for $18.00 a night per person." Mine & Sontsa's eyes must have immediately lit up because for a 2-person room, it would normally cost around $30.00 each a night. The man apparently picked up on our excitement & tried to calm us down, saying, "Now, when I say small...I mean small. The door hits the bed when you open it." Sontsa & I looked at each other with a smile, and replied, "We'll take it."

Turns out, the man wasn't kidding. Sontsa & I couldn't even physically walk into the room at the same time. One person had to walk in first, shut the door, shimmy to the other side of the room, then the next person could open the door and come in. Haha! The 'room' apparently wasn't even a true room according to the hostel standards either: all of the other rooms were numbered, while ours was just labeled "B." I guess not too many people actually stay in that room, or at least not for as long as we did. Whenever we mentioned to someone in the hostel which room we were in, they'd be like, "Ohhh..you're in that room." Haha...too funny. Needless to say, it made for a very amusing week. To our surprise (and the surprise of others), we ended up staying in that room for 6 nights total. It probably would have been a different story, except for the fact that I too came down with Sontsa's sickness shortly after arriving in Dunedin. I suppose it was unavoidable, as we had been sharing a mattress on the floor for a solid week & were together all the time. So, as a courtesy to the other hostel residents, we opted to stay in our itty bitty tiny private room in order to contain our sickness.

We didn't get to experience as much of Dunedin as we would have liked due to our lovely illness, as well as some bad weather days. However, we really enjoyed all of the things that we did get to see. Much of our time outside of the hostel was spent walking around the town and just checking out the city sights while the weather was nice. Dunedin was much bigger than we had expected, plus it had a really good vibe to it. It had a really beautiful cathedral, some old stone churches that were pretty sweet, and some cool museums. The only museum we ended up making it to was the Otago Museum. It was good though, and we particularly enjoyed an interactive exhibit it had on human faces. Sontsa & I also went on a tour around the Cadbury Chocolate Factory in Dunedin & got lots of free chocolate...mmmm! At one point, our guide gave us each a tiny little cup of melted chocolate that was apparently incredibly sweet. Everyone in the tour group somewhat struggled to finish their cups. However, I believe my taste buds had not fully come back to top-working order from being sick because I surprised everyone by downing mine in a matter of seconds...they even gave me a second cup =)

The best thing we did in Dunedin, however, was taking the local city bus 20 minutes away to a place called Tunnel Beach. The bus driver dropped us off in an area that just had fields, some cows, some horses, and some sporadic homes. He told us just to follow the two people that had gotten off the bus before us & we'd eventually run into the path that would take us to Tunnel Beach. Along the way, we stopped to say hello to a couple of cows (who ignored us) & then stopped to pet a couple of horses. The horses weren't that interested either though...oh well. After about a 20-minute walk behind the couple, we did indeed find the sign for Tunnel Beach. The bus driver, however, had failed to mention the fact that the pathway down to Tunnel Beach was: 1) slightly long, 2) verrrrrry muddy. Since the path was mostly downhill, the mud made it just a tad bit slippery. In order not to fall on our arses, we had to hold onto the sides of the fence & walk one foot carefully in front of the other right along the fenceline where the ground was the least slippery.

After a careful 30-minute walk down, we came upon a scene of massive cliffsides jutting out into the ocean, some vibrant green hills, and waves crashing into some huge rocks that were in the water. It was beautiful. When we walked further out onto the green hill that spanned into the water, we noticed a tunnel that had been built into the side of the hill. I excitedly entered the tunnel & walked down to see where it lead. It turned out that its purpose was to take you to the actual shoreline of the beach. However, the tide was way too high & the waves were crashing on the rocks like mad crazy, so there was really no way for us to go explore the shoreline. We stayed at the end of the tunnel for a few minutes though taking some pictures when all of a sudden, a cute little seal came onto the rocks! It was soooooooo adorable!! He was so curious about us too & kept inching his way closer in our direction, watching us with his sweet little brown eyes. Oh, I was just so happy to see that little guy! Tunnel Beach was definitely one of my favorite spots on the south island. The sad thing is that no one ever talks about it. The only reason we even knew it existed was because our hostel happened to have a picture of it on the wall--lucky for us!

Now, you may remember that Sontsa & I had wanted to rent a car for part of our travels on the south island; you may also remember that she & I are horrible planners. Yeahhh...that whole rental car thing didn't work out so well haha. It was one of those deals where we made a potential plan (we'd get a car from Dunedin, drive the east coast, then drop it off in Christchurch), but then we just kept talking about it, looked up rental car rates from time to time, made a couple of phone calls here and there, but never actually booked anything. So, when we finally got around to calling the rental car companies in Dunedin to make the reservation, there were absolutely no cars available except for outrageously expensive ones-- strike 2 for poor planning. In an attempt to learn from our prior mistakes, we finally changed our ways! Our second to last day in town, we pre-booked an afternoon bus a week ahead of time for May 24th from Kaikoura (which we knew would be our last stop on the south island) to Christchurch & went to the Flight Centre to book a flight from Christchurch back to Auckland for the same evening of the 24th. I must say, planning in advance felt pretty good. Then, we even pre-bought some tickets to go see a movie that night in Dunedin =)

Yes, for one of our last nights in Dunedin, we decided to spoil ourselves by going to see a movie at the cinema. I pre-planned to have glorious movie popcorn as my dinner & it was just as satisfying as I had hoped. The movie, Water for Elephants, was really well-done--great film. It was a perfect evening out! Going out to the cinema can be pretty expensive, so it is somewhat of a luxury for backpackers; I miss it soo much. Our final night in Dunedin was spent seeing one last tourist attraction: the "Steepest Street in the World." Umm....yeahhh....I think New Zealanders need to go hit the streets of San Francisco or something & see if they still want to try and claim that title. It was steep, sure, but seriously... Sontsa & I just looked at each other saying, "Well, I'm soo glad we paid to take the city bus all the way across town to see this. It's sooo greeeeat." Haha. In New Zealand's defense though, we did hear from a couple of Canadian friends we met that the street was in fact impressively steep once you actually took the time to climb it. Sontsa & I did not do so.

That sums up our Dunedin trip--we didn't really meet anyone in the hostel while we were there. I chatted with one guy from America for a while our first night there, but that was it. After that, Sontsa & I didn't do much socializing, partly because we were sick & partly because the people there just weren't that appealing. As for Queenstown, I forgot to mention a certain phone call I received while we were there. My NZ cell phone rang & the caller ID showed an unfamilar NZ phone number. I answered & heard on the other line, "Hello, is this Ashley King? Yes, this is George Trueman from the Immigration office in Wellington. How are you today? Very good. Ashley, I'm calling today because we have recently been made aware of some people abusing their visas in this country. Therefore, we are making phone calls to everyone who currently holds a New Zealand visa & getting details of their status in our country. Ashley, where are you in NZ right now? Uh huh...and are you currently working? No...ok. Do you plan to work? Uh huh. And I show that your visa will be expiring in September" At this point, I sternly corrected him & said that my visa didn't expire until January 2012. He replied, "Oh yes, sorry my mistake. And Ashley, do you have your passport with you?" I was sure the phone call was a hoax by this point, but didn't know who the culprit was. After a couple more fishy questions, the man's voice on the other line changed to a less professional tone & he said, "Hey Ashley, it's Ricky." It was our first couchsurfing host from Wellington haha. He was apparently bored at work. Sontsa & I ended up talking to him for a good 30 minutes or so, and of course exchanged some laughs. Oh, Ricky...good stuff. =)

Cheers,
Ash

Queenstown: Volume II

I'm so far behind on my blogs! I think Sontsa & I have been to 6 more cities since Queentown, but I haven't even finished all of my writing for Queenstown yet. I haven't really had time for blogging this past week or so, but I have a few extra hours at the moment (on the bus), so here we go. The second half of our time in Queenstown was really nice as well. Our couchsurfing host Steve had said we could stay with him as long as we'd like, but we had already pre-arranged another couchsurfing spot for our last few days in Queenstown before we had even arrived there. We never want to take advantage of the hospitality of any of our couchsurfing hosts, so we normally only set up to stay at each place for 2-3 nights. So, Sontsa & I packed up all of our stuff, said goodbye to everyone at Steve's place, and left Steve a bottle of wine & some thank you notes on the dining room table. We were going to walk down the hill into town, then make our way to the next couchsurfing spot, but Steve said he'd just drive us there instead. That was really nice.

Our next couchsurfing hosts were great too--Sophie from Whales, Aaron from Ireland & Luke from England. In their house, they had kind of a permanent couchsurfing area set up on the floor just off the living room. They just enjoy hosting people so much that they have surfers all the time, sometimes back to back during ski season. The first night we got there, Luke & Aaron didn't get home until late because Aaron had hand surgery that day (and still let us come stay!). So, Sontsa & I visited with Sophie for a few hours and watched episodes of a pretty hilarious show called The Imbetweeners. After the guys got home, we all just hung out & chatted. At one point, they had a knock on their back door & in walked two girls, Sharon & Jennie, who we had met a couple of nights before at Beau's birthday party at the previous couchsurfing house. To say the least, the girls were quite surprised to see us haha. They only stayed for a few minutes though to check on how Aaron's sugery went, then headed back out to a house party.

We stayed up for a little while longer chatting with Aaron, Luke & Sophie. They had all been living in Queenstown for over a year & had plenty of tips for things to do. I know I mentioned that Queenstown is where backpackers flock to & never want to leave. Well, the reason is because besides being beautiful, it is also the adventure capital of New Zealand AND actually has a nightlife! We have met backpackers that literally spent all of their money in Queenstown in a matter of days. It is known for its bungy jumping (the highest jump is 402 feet high!), skydiving, jetboating, rafting, parasailing, hanggliding, ziplining, skiiing...the list goes on and on. However, Sontsa & I were very good girls and barely spent any money in Queenstown. One reason being that everything is so expensive: he highest bungy is almost $300 NZD alone! However, there are also many things to do in Queenstown that don't cost much money.

One of the main areas for activities in the town is up this massive hill--at the top, you have seriously crazy mountain biking trails, ziplining tracks, a bungy, and something called luging that is basically like high-speed, downhill go-carting. Luke & Aaron both worked the luge rides on the mountain. So, Luke told us to come up the next day while he was working & he'd hook us up with some deals. We had the option of either taking a gondola ride up to the top OR doing an hour-long hike up the moutain. Being the troopers we are, we decided to take on the challenge of the latter. Let me just say...it was quite a little hike, more like a climb at times. Most of it didn't consist of any real path, just rocks & trees that had orange arrows spraypainted on them to tell you which direction to go. It was well worth is when we got to the top though--such a wonderful view of the city, the lake, and the mountains.

Luke had told us to text him when we got to the top, so I texted him that we were just taking a short rest at the picnic tables, then we'd make our way to the luging. Well, two hours later after our 'short rest' and a hot chocolate break at the cafe, we felt fully recovered from our hike & made it over to the luging. Luke gave us some luging tickets, but not before teasing us about our 'short' break at the picnic tables =) Haha. After getting properly fitted with helmets, Sontsa & I did 6 rounds of luging down the hill, taking the chairlift back up the hill after each time. It was really fun =) A big camera on the hill took pictures while you were the chairlift, but you could never tell when it was taking the photo. So, Sontsa & I looked half-retarded with permanent smiles on our faces each time we went up on the chairlift, determined to get a good picture =) After our luging adventures, we took a relaxing gondola ride back down to the very bottom of the hill. It was a good day.

The next day while Luke & Sophie were at work, Sontsa & I went ice skating! Since Aaron was out of work because of his surgery, he came along too for moral support =) It was my first time skating on real ice, so I was quite excited. My only other 'ice skating' experience was in Panama City, Florida where the floor was made of a cutting board material & drenched in oil to make it slick...not exactly comparable to real ice. To my surprise, I did really well (for a beginner). I only fell once, and that was only when I started to get cocky & unsuccessfully tried to do a fancy turn. What made the experience more interesting was a young local girl named Freya. You see, Freya was about 8 years old, and was apparently an 'expert' ice skater. She came up to me on the ice and said in a strong Kiwi accent, "You look a bit wobbly. For your own benefit, I think you need to use this." She handed me this little push-buggy thing that beginners (moreso children) are supposed to use until they are totally comfortable on the ice. Yes...I used the stupid buggy. I was perfectly fine without it, but she made sure to reiterate its importance to me whenever she saw me skating around on my own. Aaron was of course laughing from the sidelines the whole time Freya was instructing me haha. Luckily, she eventually got distracted by some other skaters that were a hell of a lot worse than me & finally left me alone =)

After ice skating, Aaron went to run some errands & Sontsa and I walked around the Queenstown Gardens, which were really beautiful--the leaves on the trees were changing for the season with bright reds and oranges. To my dismay, it was during this time that my camera stopped working properly =( It will now only take green or purple photos & apparently has a faulty sensor, according to a camera shop I took it to. So, since then, Sontsa has been letting me use her camera, which has been really nice. It actually works out as a fair tradeoff too because I have been sharing my laptop with Sontsa all this time. I will have to buy a new camera when Sontsa leaves NZ next week though. After the gardens, we went back into town & ran into two of our favorite backpackers, Rachel & Vinnie from Napier! I was soo excited to see them again! We couldn't talk too long though because Sontsa & I had already pre-scheduled to go to the ice bar in town at 5:00 pm.

There is a 'special deals' website specifically for activities in Queenstown that Sontsa & I had booked cheap tickets for the ice bar on. I had been dying to go to an ice bar ever since James from Florida had told me about one he'd been to in Alabama. So, we got to the check-in area for the bar, which was called Minus 5, and were fitted with gloves and a big fur-rimmed jacket. Then, a guy from Ireland told us he was going to be our bartender for the evening & to follow him. The next room was the actual bar & absolutely everything was made of ice--the bar, the seats, the cups, etc. The room temp was -7 degrees celcius, so we weren't allowed to stay longer than 30 minutes. It was pretty sweet though; there were ice sculptures everywhere and changing light colors. Plus, our entry included a free mixed drink...not too shabby.

Later in the evening, Aaron, Luke & Sophie had a couple of Irish friends over to the house--Max & Bryan (who they called Charlie when he drank haha). We all hung out for a while having a couple of drinks, then planned to go into town. Remember I said that Queenstown had a nightlife; this is a very big deal since it is one of the only 3 cities or so in NZ that does! So, Sontsa & I had been looking forward to going out in Queenstown for months. However, leading up to that day, Sontsa had been feeling somewhat under the weather & had a cough for a couple of weeks. Well, that night after the ice bar, she felt A LOT worse. When it came time to head to town with the guys, she felt pretty wretched & opted to stay in and get some rest. Sophie had to work the next day, so she didn't go out either. I walked to town with Aaron, Luke, Max & Bryan, and also planned to meet up with Rachel and Vinnie while we were out. When I told the guys about Rach & Vinnie, they got super excited about meeting mine & Sontsa's Irish friends, so we headed straight to where they were. All of the Irish hit it off famously & the whole group of us, plus two of Rach & Vinnie's friends, went to 3 or 4 bars throughout the evening, danced, and had SUCH a great time. I found out Bryan is called Charlie when he drinks not for any bad reason, but just because he gets very happy, starts bringing out crazy Irish dance moves & going wild on the dance floor haha. It was soo great to catch up with Rach & Vinnie again too.

We didn't do too much else in Queenstown while we were there, although we did meet up one day with Emily who we'd met in Wanaka & one of her friends for hot chocolate. That was quite nice. We actually went to the cafe where Beau worked as a chef, so we ended up seeing Beau's dad & were able to nod a quick hello to Beau. Sontsa & I also ate out for one meal at the NZ-famous Fergburger; it is known all over NZ for having incredible burgers & chicken sandwiches, and it lived up to its expectations. We got our sandwiches to-go & ate our lunch on a bench overlooking the lake. One more thing worth mentioning is that Sontsa & I had expected to run into 'our friend' Armin again from Austria while we were in Queenstown, but never did. We messaged him and found out he had already left Queenstown & traveled to a nearby city about 45 minutes way called Cromwell. He apparently does less research than Sontsa & I though because he didn't realize how small the town was until he got there. He then went to I-site to get some information on any activities he could do, only to be told by the lady that there literally was nothing for him to do haha. Plus, buses barely went through Cromwell, so he was stuck there for a couple of days. Oh, poor Armin. Our Queenstown experience was wonderful overall though, with great couchsurfing hosts & plenty of good memories.

Cheers,
Ash