Coast-to-Coast...to Coast: Queenstown - our favorite small big town

After much deliberation about whether to drive through the Catlins on our way to the western side of the South Island, we decided we were running out of time and needed to speed things up a bit...traveling at a leisurely pace is great until you've got two weeks left and half a country left to still see! So we drove straight from Dunedin to Queenstown and decided to stay there for a few days before we headed down to Milford Sound and Fiordland because the forecast was five straight days of rain...

Our plan for Queenstown was for Don to do some mountain biking and just to see the area, including Lake Wanaka, which is about an hour away from Queenstown. Our first day, I dropped Don off at Rabbit Ridge Mountain Bike Resort; I should mention that after dropping Don off, I stopped at the A.J. Hacket Bungy Jump site outside Queenstown and watched several people bungy jump off the bridge. It was exhilarating just watching other people do it...I think I had butterflies in my stomach for them!

After exploring Queenstown a bit on my own, I did a little shopping before hunkering down in a lovely cafe with the first ever iced coffee I'd had in weeks. I think I mentioned before that usually iced coffee in NZ means that it has both cream and ice cream in it. This one was just espresso over ice with some soy milk and sugar in it. I also went to the grocery store to find some lunch before driving down the Esplanade, finding parking, and sitting on the shore of Lake Wakatipu. The view I had while eating my lunch was one of the best views I've experienced during the whole trip.