Farewell to Old Blue

 

Today is the day we say goodbye to our bus after 5,500kms – actually three different buses but this one’s our favourite.

We had a slow start in Te Anau. We weren’t leaving until 11:00 so we slept in until 8:30 – wild – had breakfast and checked out. It was a very nice room so it would have been good to stay longer.

It was only about 100kms drive to Queenstown, great scenery all the way.

We stopped in Athol for some very good flat whites and couldn’t resist a raspberry muffin to go with them. After Athol, we drove long the bottom edge of the Remarkables range – apparently named because on finding that the ridge line ran almost exactly north to south, a British surveyor in the 1800s declared them ‘remarkable’. The road also skirted Lake Wakatipu. This is a long thin lake shaped lake a stretched out letter ‘Z’. The Maori tradition has it that the shape is that of the evil giant Matau sleeping with his knees up. It’s the longest and deepest lake in New Zealand and the third largest. It’s also the second purest lake in the world – the water is 99.9% perfect, better than bottled water.

We stopped for a brief photo-stop before the final leg into Queenstown.

We were dropped off at a bus stop just outside town to make our way up to our AirBnB apartment, home for the next week. We settled in quickly then went into town, had a quick wander round then shared a pizza at the Fat Badger Pizza emporium. We were in a hurry so we could make it up the Skyline Gondola to the observation point 500m above the town in time for sunset.

We watched the light fade over the lake then waited around for the stars to come out. The Milky Way was clearly visible. The familiar shape of Orion was easy to pick out but the opposite way up to what we’re used to.