Wanaka Homestead Lodge & Cottages

... Wanaka in the evening and it was bloody freezing. After we checked in me and James (Peachy) went to do some shopping. In the evening Jo, Lisa, Lloyd, James and me went to the bar in the hostel. It was quite a fun evening, James and me entered a nintendo Wii competition for free to win some prices, unfortunately we werent that great. We spent the evening admiring Jo's dancing moves especially the Old Man dance, and all joined in and busted some moves on the dancefloor into the early morning.

... water was running uphill and we could stand at strange angles. It messed with our heads and made us feel dizzy! Another room made David appear like a giant and me tiny, by messing with the perspective. After all of this we got frustrated with the puzzles in the cafe, and then found a nice hostel in Wanaka. We decided to try crumbed lasagne for dinner, which was horrible!

... we went to Puzzling World, which comprised of illusion rooms and a 'Great Maze'. The illusion rooms had a room of following faces and a room that made it look like the person in the left corner was much bigger than the person on the right. The 'Great Maze' to be fair was really difficult (average time for difficult route is 1.5hrs). We raced, we had to get to the yellow corner followed by the blue, green, red and then to the finish (next to the start). I was ahead at first ...

... per dinar a un mirador on se'ns mengen les sandflies... son com uns mosquits ooohhh... em sembla que s'han atipat mes ells que nosaltres! La carretera de curves a traves dels boscos continua, un dels llocs mes espectaculars sera el Cameron Flat mirador... un lloc de cine! Seguirem la vora del llac Wanaka fins arribar a la mateixa ciutat. A la tarda basicament buscarem un lloc on poguem connectar/nos a internet aquesta nit. Al vespre ...

We spent the night in Haast - a tiny town on the coast. It was pouring rain, but we ventured out anyway to try to find penguins. We were told of sightings just earlier in the week. We drove up and down the coast, managed to find some footprints, but no penguins. There's a sad photo of B2 in the pouring rain looking down a beach in hopes of spotting the little buggers. We pressed inland - a long drive - with many views/lookouts/waterfalls on the way. As soon ...

... hundreds of killometers away from where you met them at first. There were also many more new Israelis there that I spent the evening with until I got so tired I crashed to bed. I woke up late in the morning after a good night sleep, did some shopping, uploaded some pics to the net, had lunch and went off to the popular city of Queenstown.

... we might escape the rain. This was not to be, but we found a motel in Wanaka that was right in town so we could walk around under cover. We found a great bar with a roaring fire outside (Woody's) which was perfect in the rain, and they had a good restaurant upstairs. Petrol in Franz was $168.9 a litre which is somewhat more than the usual $138.9 but really only means about $10 difference in filling the tank.

... thought that we were going to see a film called Taken, but the schedule had changed and they were showing James Bond (my fav - so Becs you will be pleased to know I have been to see a new James Bond). Have to say the home made ice-cream and cookie were out of this world. I was so full up from the cookie that evening I only had a ham sandwich for tea!! So the weary feet were going back on the road to Queenstown - in the car I hasten to add I wasn't actually walking. xx

... hour or so, by which time the clouds would have hopefully blown over...

And for once, that's exactly what happened!

We went back to the hostel, made a packed lunch, grabbed our hiking stuff and ...

... into the valley the clouds disappeared, and with them the rain. HOORAH! (..."and there was much rejoicing"...)

This momentous event even brought a jubilant (if off-key) version of "The sun has got his hat on" from our intrepid ...