Queenstown Hotels
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Leaving the South Island
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I arrived in Queenstown January 5, 2007 and it was cold, windy, and overcast (typical weather for the Queenstown). I would like to mention it was sunny and nice along the southern scenic route and it seems the cold weather only lingers when I approach Queenstown. The downtown is so dreary and any resemblance to a quaint alpine village one would see in Europe or North America is totally lost on me (it has looongggg way to go to get that feeling in my opinion). Get rid of all the tourist shops and bungy jumping and you may start to get there. I would like to mention that most of the people that live and work here seem to really like it. It was crowded as usual and most of the campsites were fully booked until I checked the shotover campsite by the Kawarua River (they had a few campsites available). I checked in and was asked how my holiday was going, mind you, I just wanted to get the hell out of Queenstown. I said fine, except Queenstown is awfully cold to which the response was "it gets much colder" (mind you this is peak summer according to the calendar). There were a few mix ups on tent sites which has been a fairly common occurrence when staying at holiday parks and should be expected. The shotover campsite was situated just a 5 minute walk from the Kawarua River which was really nice except for the fact that you could hear the roar of cars passing by at night time. My main reason for staying the night in Queenstown was to book a flight to Auckland which is what I did.
The following morning I asked if I could leave all my camping equipment with the staff at the top ten holiday park to which they obliged. Left aligned photo tag:
I was so glad to be leaving Queenstown and even though it is a beautiful area, the cold and touristy environment has entirely rubbed me in a bad way. I drove to the airport and parked my rental car and proceeded inside the airport. The weather for the day was clear and sunny with temperatures in the high sixties (ohh..do I feel a warm spell coming on?). I had hoped on plugging in my laptop and catching up on some blogging, but can you believe I could not find a single electrical socket in the entire airport. The plane departed without a hitch and the only parting thought I could muster is I am not gonna miss this place (Queenstown that is).
I arrived in Auckland unsure where I would be staying or doing for the next few days. I did the tourist thing and went to the i-site visitor center and told them what I was looking for. I can say by appearances what I asked for and what I got were two different things. I stayed at a hotel called City Life in downtown Auckland which by appearances was a nice hotel but it wasn't until I got to my room that I realized it was one of those hotels that charges you for everything (I am surprised there wasn't a fee for turning on the water). I had to decide how I was going to spend my few remaining days in New Zealand because I hadn't planned it before hand. The phrase "get the hell out of Auckland" was still in my head, but I hadn't seen anything in the city so I decided to stay two days
(I thought that would be enough). I decided on a tour of the Rangitoto Island and the Maritime museum (both had high ratings of must see attractions while in Auckland). Rangitoto Island is highly visible from the sky tower and is the largest dormant volcano in the Auckland area. The tour was informative although a bit dusty driving through the volcanic ash. I returned to the mainland and headed over to the Maritime Museum which was rather enjoyable (I got one of those taking MP3 players that give you audio on the displays). I would recommend a good three hours to tour the Maritime museum properly. On my way back to the hotel, I viewed a Maori performance in the plaza of the entrance to the sky tower which was a delightfully visual treat (the performances are held daily at 6:30PM).
The following morning, I called Air New Zealand and made arrangements for my return to San Diego, though I wasn't really keen on returning just yet. I had five more days in New Zealand and so I decided I would drive down to Wellington, an area and environment I had really enjoyed (yes it's all the way at the other end of the North Island). I had really made any arrangements for renting a car and thought I would inquire about the train from Auckland to Wellington to mitigate the expense of renting a car and enjoy the scenery from a different angle.
The train wasn't departing again until the following day so I rented a car from Avis and began my journey south along the west coast. I had thought about touring the east coast, but wanted to see Mt Taranaki around New Plymouth (hindsight..I maybe should have chosen east because they do get more sunshine hours). I arrived in New Plymouth at about 7:30PM and stayed at a rather nice motel (full kitchen, microwave, free broadband, coffee, and tea). It's a funny thing staying at motels in New Zealand, they ask you what kind of milk you would like and check the room out before giving you the keys. One strange thing did happen while I stayed here though. One of the other guests stated I was parked in their parking space (this is a motel right?). I obliged and moved my car, though the statement kinda made me do a double take and when I was looking at the information guide in the motel room,no mention of assigned parking spaces was stated (weird...). The motel was great aside from that, and I go the impression the New Plymouth area was kinda an upscale, slighty pricey area to stay and geared toward married couples in their forties or something like that.
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