New Zealand in review - Day 6 - Queenstown Dinner

This photo probably won't mean much to anyone else other than Luke and me. But I think it is beautiful. It is the lights of Queenstown from the restaurant at the top of the Gondola.

Mrs Nic kicked us out and Luke and I enjoyed the marvellous buffet at the top of the Gondola. We went up at 5.30pm, we watch paragliders continue to fly off the Peak, we sat in the bar with the cable cars whisking past the windows and then we enjoyed a lovely meal while watching the light change from afternoon to dusk to evening. Beautiful!

For after dinner entertainment we listened to the screams of the night bungy jumpers and swingers in the dark just below the restaurant. Crazy folk but gave us a laugh.

New Zealand in review - Day 6 - Queenstown

Our first fun in Queenstown was a trip up the Gondola at the top of Bob's Peak. The gondola ride was deemed fun by Gondola veteran Georgia.

Just inside the door at the top of the gondola is one of the karts that is used on the luge track. Ethan would have been happy to sit on it and not move for the rest of the day.

While waiting for the luge track to open, Luke found there was paragliding operating off the peak. So he was strapped to a 'pilot', ran off the edge of the mountain and sailed off in front of our eyes. Georgia was very unimpressed that she couldn't go too.

After Luke returned safely, he, Nic and the munchkins went luge riding. I took lots of pics but in most of them, the people look too small to be noticeable. I was happy to sit and enjoy the view. It looked so perfect it could have been a blue screen.

New Zealand in review - Day 5 - Franz to Queenstown

What is it like travelling with a time bomb? Or two? To say I was very nervous about travelling with car sick king Ethan and gastro post one day Georgia between Franz Josef and Queenstown is an understatement. But with towels at the read and the lightest of breakfasts, we ventured off. First stop was a quick photo snap at the Fox Glacier.






Then lovely river/steam views through Haast Pass.









We found a terrific park on the edge of Lake Wanaka and the munchkins had a great time running around there while we enjoyed the magnificent view across the lake to snow capped peaks.




And then we got brave. Which route to Queenstown? The 120km route via Cromwell or the 70km Crown Range Road via Cardrona. With Mummy taking the wheel and driving as slowly and carefully as she could, we made it to Queenstown via the Crown Range Road. It is listed as the highest main road in New Zealand. To me it was the quickest option to get us where we needed to be! And the views weren't bad either......

New Zealand in review - day 4 - Franz Josef

Part 2 of our day in Franz Josef....

A pic of Luke and Georgia on a quadbike outside the adventure place where Luke was waiting for his quadbike tour.

And a pic of the Franz Josef glacier. Thankfully this view was only a few minute walk from the car park. My type of hiking :)

New Zealand in review - Day 4 - Franz Josef

I didn't sleep soundly. I felt uneasy. And when I woke up I found that Georgia had been sick during the night and was suffering from a nasty bout of gastro. Thank goodness for a motel laundry about 10 steps from our unit. It had an honesty box for laundry money and I told the owner that he could probably retire on the proceeds of the MANY loads I did.


Motel was http://www.bellavistafranzjosef.co.nz/ and Adam, the owner, was a treasure.


The weather was clearing so Luke got to tick one of his 'New Zealand to do list' items off the list when he took a helicopter flight up into the snow
at the top of the Glacier. He said it was FANTASTIC.


Georgia started to improve during the early afternoon so with Nic and me taking the munchkins to the playground and then for a walk, Luke headed off on a quad bike excursion. Mud, scenery and bikes apparently are a perfect boy combination. Each to their own I say!


The thought of driving down to Queenstown with a recovering Georgia + Maestro of the Carsick Ethan didn't appeal so wonderful Adam priced flights for us. At $2500+, it would have been cheaper to fly to Australia. It was one of those rare times in life that I would have loved to be rich and say 'fabulous, yes, no problem, we'll do that then'. Alas for living within your means.

New Zealand in review - Day 3 - Christchurch to Franz Josef

The day started so simply with a lovely drive across the Canterbury Plains. Beautiful green fields, snow capped mountains - just lovely. And then we hit the winding road into Arthur's Pass. Still gorgeously scenic.

Had lunch at the Wobbly Kea (amazing cheese/garlic bread!)
at Arthur's Pass and we were not two minutes down the road when Ethan got car sick. And that turned out to be car sick episode 1 and episodes 2, 3 and 4 were to follow.

Winding mountain roads don't often present easy places to stop to try and clean up and change a very unhappy little guy. It wasn't fun.

By the time we got to Hokitika, our thoughts of a nice wander around the greenstone/jade, glass, jewellery shops were replaced with a trip to the local supermarket to buy towels!


By the time we arrived in the lovely little township of Franz Josef, I was totally over car travel - as I think all five in the car were - and very glad of the promise of a rest day to follow. Little did I know.

New Zealand in review - Day 2 - Christchurch

The credit for our sightseeing today goes to Aunty Leanne and Uncle Steve who visited Christchurch last year and gave us a list of what to see that was child-friendly. As always, they were so right!

We started the day with a wander through the beautiful Botanical Gardens. What we thought would be an hour or so turned into a 2-1/2 hr meander which was delightful...other than Georgia's tantrums because she wanted to push Ethan's stroller and he was just as determined she wouldn't push him.

We saw the beautiful Avon, the lovely Gardens and found the terrific playground. We also had a quick wander through the lovely Canterbury Museum.




After lunch time snoozes all round, we headed off to the Gondola. We saw snow capped mountains in the distance and Ethan would have been happy to sit in the playroom at the top all afternoon.

Lovely Lyttleton was spread out below us and after heading back down in the Gondola, we had THE MOST AMAZING fish 'n' chips there from Lyttleton Fisheries. Luke is not a chip man but he LOVED their chips. That says a lot!

New Zealand in review - Day 1 - Brisbane to Christchurch

No matter how prepared I am, no matter what time of day or night we leave, I don't sleep the night before a flight. As we were being collected at 6.30am on Thursday 9 April for our trip to the International Airport, I was wide awake and ready to roll well before dawn.

How to get four people, including a child needing a seat + a mountain of luggage to the airport proved to be a challenge in itself.

Being early, I didn't want to ask my ever helpful and obliging parents (just as well as it turned out Dad needed a root canal or some other yucky sounding dental thing done early that morning so he wouldn't have been available anyway), driving ourselves and parking for 2 weeks would have cost nearly A$200, a taxi wouldn't fit all our stuff, a maxi-taxi won't guarantee their arrival time as disabled clients take priority (and rightly so I say!) so our option was a private transfer. And I found:

http://www.luxinblack.com/

What a way to travel! Magnificent van and driver (John) , perfectly on time, help unloading at the airport - we couldn't have asked for more. When we were flying home, Georgia asked 'John pick us up in his van?'. She's obviously decided John is her preferred mode of travel on airport commutes from now on. Can't say I blame her.


Accompanying us on our New Zealand excursion was the ever marvellous Mrs Nic. Known as Nicole to the rest of the universe. Our children love Nic, she seems to enjoy them too and our friendship with her and husband Craig stretches back nearly a decade. As Craig is currently on assignment in the USA, Nic volunteered to come travelling with us to be our extra set of hands. What a woman! I know that there is a real St Nic and I'm so lucky that she's my friend :)



So we all checked in, loaded off oversize baggage (stroller and car seat), did the Customs thing, walked a mile or two or three to the departure gate (yes, it was the second last gate at the airport and the walk from the Duty Free Shops/food outlets to the gate took 7 minutes - I know - I did that walk three times) and waited for the plane.

Flights aren't overly fun for most people but a fuller than full flight and two very exuberant children isn't my idea of a fun way to start the day. After flying over lots of beautiful snow capped mountains as we crossed New Zealand, when we landed in Christchurch things degenerated from bad to worse as Georgia had just had enough. So getting her through Immigration and Customs involved a lot of screaming (from her although I was tempted to join in), crying (still her although I was thinking about it) and tantrums.


Thank goodness New Zealand realises that travelling with munchkins is a challenge and has an express lane for people with children. LOVE IT! The staff were superb in trying to assist us, bringing her a drink, holding her hand and trying to talk to her while other staff whisked us through and told us to bypass the exit line, which we happily did, to get us out of there as soon as they could.


Picked up hire car, fitted all baggage and people into van, found the very comfy and super clean motel (http://www.riccartonmallmotel.co.nz/) and went straight across the road to McDonald's where they have a huge and amazing indoor play centre. Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful!


Nic and I had to test out the shopping so we went into the Riccarton Mall to buy groceries. Yes, after we did a lap of the specialty shops and decided that shopping in NZ is very like shopping in Australia. Not a lot of difference in stock.


We found Pak'Nsave and oh how we loved that place. Nic exclaimed 'It is just like a Bunnings - BUT FOR FOOD!!!'. We had far too much fun, went back to McD's to collect Luke and the munchkins and fell into bed.