Wednesday, November 3, 2010

South island part 4: Southern Lakes, Fiordland

made it through the "Gates of Haast" to arrive at the top of Lake Wanaka, marking the arrival to the great Southern Lakes District.
a night in an unfortunately cloudy Wanaka meant no scenic shots, off to Queenstown via Cromwell

wine tasting in the Gibbston Valley, great stuff!, this is at Peregrine
another vineyard, Internationally acclaimed Gibbston Valley winery. With a boutique cheesery on premises! nice.
they age the wine here in a cave in the mountain!
Arrowtown, another goldminers town, but this one is a totally functioning town with schools and everything. but they've kept the main street totally old school. choice!

Queenstown! NZ's number one ski resort town. I always get the tingles when I'm here! even though the ski fields closed the day we arrived, enjoy that springtime slush guys.if you've never been here, boo for you. Its my favorite place on the whole island. this is the lakefront, which the town is built around.
here's some work i did in the Queenstown Hell pizza store.

up the top of the lake from Queenstown, is an almost town called Glenorchy, another dead end. Its near Saurumans house. we were hit with a mad snowstorm whilst enjoying lunch on the lake and had to do the bolt!
we went the whole way round Wakatipu, and were rewarded with same amazing views! this is from a secluded little pebble beach. Skimming stones country

at the end of the lake was a tiny town called Kingston, home of the historic Kingston Flier train that starred in the Crunchy Bar commercials.
what a soft target. Too soft! maybe i'm getting old, but there ain't no graffiti in this part of nowhere and maybe its fine just like that.
here i am in Te Anau township, the gateway to Fiordland. or did i go the wong way?
we didnt have the time to go all the way to Milford Sound, but got to enjoy some time on Lake Te Anau, largest lake in South Island.
then further south we went to Manapouri, nz's second deepest lake. pristine
then it was see ya later fiordland. end of the line... the southern coast, looking west towards fiordland

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