Wanaka Homestead Lodge & Cottages

... ourselves by the fire and felt really at home. <br><br>We walked for hours around the lake and had fun playing in the kids playground, they had an 'egg cup' type thing which i sat in - and it span me around 360 degrees, and kept spinning and spinning!! I was in hysterics and couldn't stop. Josh stood there laughing and filming it! haha until i got him to sit in it!! <br>

... to Rippon Winery. (OK I admit this is one reason the walk appealed to me.) We then sampled a selection of their wines, served by a lovely girl from Ecuador whose family came from Quito and the Galapagos - in fact her grandparents lived close to where I was in Quito - small world! Although Sophie and I intended to continue on the walk to waterfall creek, there was hail falling out the sky and some very threatening clouds, so we headed off ...

... She's much more fun than some of them and stops off at "Jone's Fruit &amp; Veg" on the way. We both have that travel-induced laziness where we can hardly be bothered to get out of the bus. We are pleased to overcome this wave of apathy as this is a real find - so many wonderful fruits and a range of interesting fruit-derived things like dried cinnamon apple and dried raspberry covered ...

... going quite well for a while, until we realised the little buggers were climbing under the walls and going thru the emergency exits! So that failed, we were on our own!! We did quite well, finding all four corners first then making our way out in a total of 45mins! (The average is 1-1 1/2!) So we were quite chuffed with that, we rewarded ourselves with more puxxle playing.........we still didnt get home till dinner time!!

We considered driving all the way back to the albatross colony, but the morning was only slightly breezy and since it was out of our way, we decided that we were not going to befriend the albatross of NZ on this trip, and headed back inland to Wanaka, via the fruit-growing and wine regions. The driving got more and more striking as we got further inland. We had long since run out of apricots and cherries ...

... the day but hey....... We head out to lake Matheson which is near the Fox Glacier and you can also catch a sight of the famous Mount Cook. We opt out of doing the walk as my legs still don't want to work. Wanaka is an amazing place, and to be honest we have done nothing apart from sit out and look at the stunning lake and imposing mountain ranges. Sorry it's a bit boring but money is running low and our old bones beginning ...

... br><br> <br><br>...winding up the narrow track...<br><br> <br><br>...with the river thundering next to us on our left. <br><br> <br><br>The track took us up through some pretty dense woodland, and it was so ...

... br><br>It reminded me EXACTLY of an album cover by the Swedish band Soundtrack of Our Lives, and also of one by Spiritualized. Very cool.<br><br> <br><br>After that we found a bizarre sloping room which really freaked us out as things ...

... predominate, everyone was extremely friendly, to the point of letting us join in the birthday hangi on our first night. This is the Maori hot hole in the ground cooking method (similar to the Fijian lovo feast) and isn't done often as it is a lot of effort, and you can't recover the food if you unearth it too early. This one was expertly done and delicious. Rongo also has its own radio station in the back - Karamea FM plays whatever comes to hand from a huge collection of dusty LPs ...

... go at kayaking in preparation for a trip we want to do in Milford Sound. It wasn't too difficult although we're not trying out eskimo rolls. Very pleasant on a warm day in such scenery. We also got to see our third glacier, after an interesting drive over 40km of unsealed road, including eight fords, a herd of cows and a lot of potholes. (Fortunately the Bluesmobile seems able to cope, especially now Andy has found the bad earth which ...