Day 57 Queenstown Hill Hike

So after the day of my bungee jump, Queenstown needed to be explored.  My buddies Jesse and Cecilia and I decided to rent a three person bike to check out the entire town for a few hours.  There were paths all along the city so we decided to make our own tour of Queenstown.

The major path we followed went along the lake.  We went in both directions of where our backpackers inn was.  This picture was taken going south of  our building.  

This was another spot we made in the northern direction of our location.  Just beautiful scenary all around and blue water.

After a morning of biking any normal person would be hungry.  Therefore we decided to have the New Zealand famous Fergburger which lived up to it's name as a must-east on any vacation to New Zealand.  2.2 pounds of NZ free range cattle beef with alvoli sauce or however you spell it with barbaque.  MMMMMmmmmm Tasty! And that was our view of the docks as we ate.

But the exercise didn't stop there.  It was time to hike the mountain.  I took this picture as a reference point to compare to as we got higher up the mountain.  The town looks pretty big from where I am at right now.  In the following pictures you'll see how small it really is.

 The reason I put up signs on this blog is for my own memory bank haha.  The sign on the stone was an interesting little memo that actually works if you take it seriously Hopefully it's readable.

A rather epic entrance to the mountain trail and a quite beautiful piece of sculpture.  They really love their nature down here.

The forest we traversed through was dark.  I mean dark.  I took this photo with the flash on and it still came out like this.  I didn't think forests could be this thick haha that it literally seemed like dusk rather than around 1 oclock in the afternoon.  To prove my point look below.  In retrospect I also think the mountain provided a shield from some of the sun's rays somehow that added to the darkness. 

This was the first lookout point we got to.  The town in the background is not Queenstown but rather another small town off in the distance.  We couldn't see Queenstown from this lookout.

I am sure you are all wondering why I climbed a tree on the side of a mountain.  Well, Jesse and I somehow got onto the topic of who was the better mountaineer.  So we decided to have a tree climbing competition. I believe I won but I will let you decide.

Well, in all our exploring we somehow meandered into some sheep. Wild ones too!  So we decided to get to the top of the mountain we would follow their trails rather than the designated ones.  Life is so much more interesting when you don't follow the pre-made path.  MAKE YOUR OWN CHOICES HAHA

This is where the sheep trails took us.  Boy...was I happy we followed them.  Their grazing had made it pretty easy to follow.  I like this photo, just look at that background! 

Remember that picture of the town I took? How big those houses were and stuff.  Well look at it now.  Tiny tiny tiny.

A panaramic video, just to show you guys what the view looked like from the top.  It was a pretty gratifying moment to have made it and the fact that it was a beautiful day made it all the better.

Once there we sat back and took in the sunset.  All those white little dots are houses.  Look how the cloud is just chilling over top of the mountain.  Simply spectacular.

 I would also like to add that this road leads to the valleys that have no civilization what so ever.  This was one spot where part of the Lord of the Rings Triology was filmed.  Pretty cool.  It was a fun day all around!

Day 56 To Queenstown with a Bungee Jump

After a fun day on the glacier, we had to keep moving.  It was gonna be a day full of different environments and weather.

The first stop we made in the morning was at this place called Lake Matheson, the following pictures are of the lake and some of the scenes from the walk.  I was the only one to do the walk because it was raining.  Thank goodness for rain ponchos haha.

Everybody likes pictures of empty park benches and tables, so I am adding to the list.

A swing bridge!  This was my first one ever that I have crossed.  Pretty darn cool!  Although it was mini, it was still cool. 

Thundercreek falls is a permanent waterfall that runs down the side of the mountain range.  As you can tell we are in the wet part of New Zealand.  On this side of the mountain it is usually wet and rainy and takes on a rainforest type of environment.  Based on what I have seen in the last two days I think it's a pretty fair statement to say New Zealand is the land of waterfalls and mountains lol.

As this picture shows, the mountains prevent the clouds from going through to the rest of the country so the massive buildup of moisture stays on one side of the mountain.  That is why this side of the mountain range has more green plant life and a wider diversity of plants.

These two pictures go hand in hand.  The one on the left is another tiny little walk we were able to do if we wanted to.  It was like a rest stop on the way to Queenstown.  The building was dedicated to a gentleman who was dedicated to preserving the 400 plus native rainforest plant life in the region that was being lost to road construction and introduced species.

At first glance, Lake Wanaka looked pretty small as this is how I first saw it.  However, when the next 20 minutes were spent driving alongside it I realized it was longer.  Apparently the full length of the lake is something crazy like 75 kilometers.

So, this was another stop we made along the way.  This town of Wanaka is a ski resort town known for its slopes.  It's a beautiful region with plenty of hikes, kayaking and other things to do. Unfortunately it was a quite stop, but the scenary was nice.

Once out of Wanaka, the landscape changed from rainforest to a more dry scrubby environment with more grasses than rainforest life.  It also stopped raining which was awesome because nobody wants to bungee jump into the rain.

If you can ignore the glare on the right hand side, I thought this was a cool looking mountain we passed. 

On the left is the bungee location.  Look how blue the water is.  The distance between the platform and the water is 43 meters or roughly 141 feet.  My goal was to jump off this thing and get myself dunked in the water.  Here's a shout out to my cousin Kyle...Anything you can do down under, I can do too!  There's my ticket number 72.  By the way, this spot was the very first spot there had ever been a modern day bungee jump.  The creators of bungee jumping had been inspired by local indigenous tribes that would build towers and jump using vines for religious rituals and stuff.  Needless to say....the idea is now worldwide.

From the middle of the bridge, this is what I looked straight out into.  To be honest, my legs were shaking and looking down didn't help.  It takes a long of mental courage to do this.  There is no physical harm or anything like that.  You just gotta say *&%^* it and go haha.

Enjoy guys! I know I did!  It's such a rush, believe it! All ages can do it!

After my jump, I felt like a champ and there was no better feeling to be had driving off into the sunset and into Queenstown.  I felt so alive that day, knowing I had pushed myself to the limit and had succeeded.