New Zealand #1 - From Cairns, Queensland, to Queenstown, South Island - The Temperature is What?

March 27, 2016: we are about two-thirds of the way through our 'winter escape from Canada' 90 day roadtrip. We began with a week in Tahiti - starting with this post https://steemit.com/travel/@brightongreg/tahiti-1-getting-familiar-with-the-island
followed by almost 2 months in Australia starting here https://steemit.com/travel/@brightongreg/australia-1-manly-new-south-wales

A view from our caravan park!

This post might be somewhat boring compared to some of our adventures in Oz but I want to share with you our first reactions to New Zealand, because as you will see in subsequent posts much of what we experienced in our 4 weeks there was completely unexpected...

...like this first look at Queenstown, hugging the bottom of Lake Wakatipu in the Southern Alps.

When we leave Cairns on Air New Zealand the forecast for the day is (surprise) hot, humid, and 32 Celsius, the weather that we've had for most of our 5,600 kilometer roadtrip from Adelaide east through Canberra, and then north to Cairns. Four hours later, after a very pleasant flight, we arrive in Auckland to be greeted by 20 degrees and no humidity! Thankfully we are prepared and quickly grab our light jackets from the top compartment of my rolling duffle as we head for the shuttle. We couldn't get a direct connection to Queenstown so have to overnight at a hotel by the airport. It's the most expensive night of our trip (unless you count the overnight on The Ghan from Alice Springs to Adelaide), and we add to the financial pain by having a very nice dinner at the restaurant in the hotel, partly because there's nothing else nearby, partly because we're too tired to go out. Thankfully brightonbonnie subsidizes the travel fund by paying for the wine...

Our first look at Queenstown at ground level, along the shoreline to the left...

... looking the other way we see The Remarkables, a well-known Queenstown landmark.

The next morning there is some cloud, with a forecast of 24 Celsius. We pass on the very expensive hotel breakfast and after check-in have a quick and not-too-bad Egg McMuffin. Our flight south is delayed about 30 minutes but we pass the time talking to two families from Alexandra who have been in Auckland 11 days, their sons participating in the National BMX Championship. One couple were married in Niagara Falls and hope to return there in 2017 for their 25th Anniversary. When the husband says they also want to walk along the shore of all the Great Lakes, on the trail passing right by our home, I give him our 'traveling' card with all our contact information – it's now the end of September 2017 and we haven't heard from them, but it's a very long walk, and who knows?

Our second cabin, the very nice one, in the Top10 caravan park at Arthurs Point.

We arrive in Queenstown after a 90 minute flight, with spectacular views of the town, lake and surrounding mountains. As we descend the pilot tells us it's 13 Celsius! What? Fortunately when we deplane it feels hotter because the sun is directly overhead. Picking up our new rental, a Toyota SUV, is very slick, except even though I have a lot of experience driving on the wrong side of the road I have to get the mandatory 'never driven in NZ' safety briefing, which seems to focus a lot on one-lane bridges ( I'm not sure why - how many can there be?).

Our park is surrounded by mountains...

Top10 is our new caravan park chain, and their database apparently hasn't been updated so GPS takes us to the old park right in Queenstown; fortunately reception is used to this and quickly redirects us to the new Top10 affiliate about 10 kilometers out of town. The wonderful drive up to Arthurs Point is completely unexpected, as is the surrounding terrain. Our first cabin is not that good, because since Queenstown is so busy I had trouble booking, and we have to take the last unit remaining, which didn't have much in the way of cooking facilities and no place to wash dishes - brightonbonnie was not amused!

...and more mountains

...and more in close-up

...and closer still!

After check-in we return to the town hoping to get late lunch but it’s super-busy so we can't even find parking let alone a place to eat - but that's a story for another post! We head back to Arthurs Point, have a very simple meal, and are early to bed, as it's been a tiring 2 days en route from Oz, including a 3 hour time change...

The view on the road outside the park gate, looking south down the valley towards Queenstown, brightonbonnie much happier once we moved into the very nice cabin!

PS - if you've enjoyed this post please check out the previous 19 posts in my Australia series, and the 3 before that as we started our 90 day roadtrip in Tahiti!

And please join us in my next post as we travel through the land of the orcs to Glenorchy!

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!steemitworldmap -44.983020 lat 168.679362 long Arthurs Point South Island New Zealand d3scr