13D12N South NZ - Glenorchy

Day 12 - Glenorchy

Today was our last day at New Zealand. Should we be excited over the journey to Glenorchy or be sad that the trip was approaching the end? We wanted to extend our stay - very much indeed, but the cost to extend the ticket was more expensive than the return ticket to NZ (well, our NZ flight ticket was a discounted one). After some consideration and a little argument, we decided not to extend and if God willing, we shall be back next time.

We drove eagerly to Glenorchy after having read so much about the scenic journey. We have our cameras ready on hand to capture what we were expecting. We saw none. Err...., well, not exactly none. Maybe I should say that it was beautiful but not awesome. After having seen so much beauty earlier, we were not that charmed by what we saw along the way. Perhaps we were already used to the sceneries or the guidebooks have raised our expectations too high and we were expecting to see heaven on earth!







Upon reaching Glenorchy, the Visitor Information Center was our first stop. We went in to ask for some information about the area and also the location of our horse riding.

After that we drove a little further, parked the car and explored the area. There were only about 3-4 cafes and the whole place was very quiet and empty - as empty as the pictures below. We had fish & chips in one of the cafes before heading to High Country Horses for our horse riding.








It was about a 15 minutes drive to High Country Horses. We have made reservation for a 3 hours horse riding to the Paradise weeks before we came and were eager to view the LOTR filming locations during the horse riding journey.






We were asked to sign an idemnity form upon arrival and were given boots, coat and a head gear to wear. Why can't they make the head gear more stylish? I looked like I was wearing a motorcycle hat! After fitting on the full set of attire, we were assigned a horse each.





By the way, this is the horse that appeared in the LOTR's movie. Don't ask me his name or which part he appeared in because I can't remember :-(. He has retired from acting and his full time job now is to pose with the tourists. Well, at least he still has a job after retirement.





My horse is Tucker. He is quite a stubborn horse because he refused to walk in line and was always the last in the line. Whenever he sees patches of grass, he wants to eat and he almost flipped me over a few times when he bend down to eat the grass. He walked so close to the trees even though there was ample space. He forgot that there was a human sitting on him and I had to brush off the branches coming directly my way with one hand while the other hand holding on to Tucker. We fought many times during the journey - Tucker wanting to eat and me struggling to pull his head up so that he stopped eating and walk. That was the first time I rode a horse and there were many things that I didn't know about a horse. I also tried to kick him to make him move faster but he just ignored me and walked his own pace. Thank God he didn't threw me over.





We rode on flat land, up and down the slopes and the streams.






It was a boring ride after a while but what an experience! After the ride we drove back to Queenstown. We had our last dinner in NZ at Surreal and I tried the same pasta (some creamy mushroom wine sauce) for the last time. It was still delicious even though it was a different restaurant this time. Oh, I am gonna miss the pasta for sure.






The next morning, we flew off with Air NZ from Queenstown to Christchurch and took the next flight home. We have driven a total of 2500 km in NZ and spent NZ$389.42 in petrol alone. We pumped our petrol at Christchurch (NZ$74.52), Greymouth (NZ$56.90), Wanaka (NZ$83), Tekapo (NZ$61), Dunedin (NZ$54) and Te Anau (NZ$60).

God has surely blessed New Zealand so much with all the beautiful nature. Please take good care of them and preserve them for many generations to come. I am so glad I came, I am glad I've seen, I am glad I have experienced it and I am now back to my homeland with fond memories of NZ :-) Till we meet again some day.

13D12N South NZ - Queenstown

Day 11 - Queenstown

We saw a small glimpse of blue sky and hoped the wind would blow away the clouds far far away. We were walking to The Station then, to buy our bus tickets to Coronet Peak which was about 20 minutes ride away. We bought the sightseeing package which is inclusive of the chairlift ride to the peak. No skiing lesson for us as we don't see a need for it. Afterall, living in a summer year round country, when would we get a chance to practice that skill?





Our Coronet Peak pass and the bus.





The ride up to Coronet Peak was very scenic. Make sure you sit on the right side of the bus.





Reached the base of Coronet Peak.





We don't ski and we were there to take pictures only :-) It was our first time on a ski resort as well. Seeing the young and old skiing there made me so envious of them, especially the kids. I wished I could just put on the gears that very moment and start skiing like them .... I heard it was not easy Well as you can see from the pictures taken, the blue sky lost badly to the clouds.









After a while, we took the chairlift up to the peak to see what was up there. What can I say but beautiful sceneries. It would have been much better if the sky was clear.





Again, we were just observing and taking pictures.

All of a sudden the weather turned very foggy and everyone was gone except us. A staff came out from the control room to inform us that the chairlifts were experiencing some technical problems and we won't be able to get down till they fixed it. We were invited into the control room to take shelter as it was really cold outside.

After about 20 minutes or so, the weather cleared and the chairlifts were fixed. People started coming up to ski again.






One of the medical team members, Dean, gave us a choice. He said that he can bring us down using the board which they normally used to bring the patients down to the base or we can take the chairlifts down. We decided to go with his suggestion and it turned out to be an experience that we would never forget. Now we know what it feels like to snowboard. Thanks Dean! You were great! By the way, what is the name of that board in the left picture?

After reaching the base, we thanked Dean, bid farewell to him and called Fly Paragliding to come and pick us from Coronet Peak for our paragliding. It appeared that we could not fly from Coronet Peak due to the bad weather and we had to detour somewhere else.





We ended up somewhere .... yeah it's somewhere because I can't remember the name of the place. I only know that it's about 1,000 ft above sea level. This was where we took off for our paragliding. Our pilots, Abe and Montano were preparing the parachutes in the pictures below.

After they put on the gears on you, you will look like a Ninja Turtle.





The running and jumping off was scary but once you took off, the experience was wonderful.

Me and my pilot, Abe. My flying gears as well.





We requested to be dropped off at the Skyline gondola after the paragliding. We spent about an hour at Skyline. It was very scenic, unfortunately it was also getting dark so we did not go for any short walk at the Skyline.







That was our Day 11, full of fun and excitement. Till today we remember clearly our "snowboarding" and flying experience and we know we will never forget that for the rest of our lives. While we look forward to our Glenorchy trip the next day, we were also sad that our holiday is coming to an end very soon.