Days 30-32 Queenstown, NZ

The day was finally here.  I was getting to fly down to the south island from Auckland to Queenstown, which is arguably the adventure capitol of the world and home to some of the world’s greatest fly fishing.  As soon as we started to approach this small town in the airplane I began to notice the huge mountains with sharp peaks that reminded me of the Rocky Mountains out west.  These are some the pictures that I took right as we got off of the plane.

We were staying in a hostel called Adventure Queenstown Hostel.  It was actually voted the best hostel in New Zealand, and it definitely lived up to its reputation.  The owner of the hostel greeted us when we arrived and he allowed us to store all of our bags until our rooms were ready.  He also informed us that he was a full booking agency for anything and everything you could imagine doing in Queenstown.  After listing off a large list of incredible activities we decided to go get a bite to eat before making any decisions.  A small group of us ended up eating at this little café called Bob Weigh’s where I had a phenomenal breakfast sandwich with bacon, scrambled eggs, and hollandaise sauce on a bagel. 

With it just being a little after 11:00 a.m. we had plenty of choices from half day vineyard tours, jet boat tours, downhill mountain biking, hiking, and the list goes on and on.  In order to give our bank accounts a rest some of us decided to take a gondola up a near by mountain for amazing views and what the locals call the  skyline luge.  I had envisioned this luge to be somewhat mediocre, but was blown away after my first ride.  Flying around sharp corners on a small motor less go-cart like luge is a blast!  Check out the website here to get a better idea of what I am talking about.  The gondola ride up and down allowed us to have beautiful views of Queenstown and the surrounding areas.

Looking down on Queenstown

The luge track

After the luge we headed back into town to find a place to hang out for a few hours before dinner.  We ended up at a place called Cowboy bar.  When you walked in you felt like you were out somewhere in Jackson Hole (I’ve never been to Jackson Hole, but from what I hear this place seems like it would fit in).  The theme was of the American west with lots of leather, wood, cowboy memorabilia, and mounted moose racks.  We were able to throw darts, shoot pool, and play shuffleboard, which was a great way to relax and soak up being in Queenstown.  It had started to rain when we were leaving and we were struggling to find a place to eat that was within our budget.  A small restaurant called Chico’s is where we ended up because they had a special on their fish and chips.  Interestingly enough though, our waiter was from California.  We then went home to get to bed early because everyone had big days planned for tomorrow.  Some were going bungee jumping over the Nevis River, and Jay and I were going fishing. 

Reel loving the cowboy bar

Our guide picked us up at 6:00 a.m. from outside of our hostel and we headed towards the small town of Glenorchy.  It took us about 45 minutes to an hour traveling down a road that probably should not have been carved out of a mountain along the side of the lake.  All of the mountains around us were snow capped due to some interesting weather for the middle of the summer.  We turned down a gravel road and traveled for about another 30 to 45 minutes to the car park (New Zealander’s backwards way of saying parking lot).  We then put on our wading boots and wading socks and started to hike towards the Caples River.  After about 30 minutes we had veered off of the trail and were walking through the valley where all of the sheep grazed.  We finally reached the river and started to rig up our rods for the day of fishing.  By now it was around 8:30 a.m. and it had started to warm up a little bit, although a light jacket was still needed.  Sam, our guide, who was in his mid to late 20’s, started to tell us about how you fish for the giant browns and rainbows in New Zealand.  It’s mostly about stalking and sighting with an emphasis on the sighting.  However, the fish are almost impossible to see even with polarized glasses and it really takes a trained eye to see them.  Thank goodness Sam was a pro.  Throughout the day we would hike up to a pool and slowly approach it from downstream.  We would then try to see any fish and then attempt to throw a fly at them.  We started out the day fishing with nymphs that were about the size of my pinky.  For those of you who don’t know, in the states you measure fish by inches, but here in New Zealand you measure them by pounds.  New Zealand is home to some of the world’s largest and toughest trout.  At the first pool that we stopped at Jay hooked a big beautiful rainbow.  We were both ecstatic to see this amazing fish and had already declared the day a very successful one.  There are some days where people go on these guided trips and don’t catch a single fish because the fishing is so technical and difficult.  We fished a few more hours and then sat down for lunch at a picturesque spot beside the river.  I had noticed that Sam did not bring but one bottle of water with for the entire day and to be completely honest was a little bit concerned about what we were going to be drinking for a full day out in the sun.  As soon as we finished that bottle he walked over to the river and filled it up again.  I thought this was awesome because there aren’t many places that you can just drink right out of the river.  We then packed back up and continued to make our way up the river.  Numerous fish outsmarted all of us pool after pool.  A couple hours later I ended up catching a gorgeous 4.5 lb. rainbow.  This is by far the biggest fish I have ever caught.  We finally made it to a beautiful gorge where we would be turning around at about 4:00 p.m.  We were able to see some gigantic browns lurking in the deep crystal clear water around the gorge.  Sam said that a couple of them were easily 8 to 10 lbs.  We both attempted to get a line out to them, but were having a little bit of trouble because we were on the side of cliff and there was no where to even cast. Jay was able to use his skills to slingshot a line out in the pool where he caught a beautiful 3 lb. brown trout.   We then took a break and tied on some streamers for the walk back.  These things were huge and ugly.  Sam informed us that most of the big browns eat mice in the evenings and some of these streamers looked just like a mouse.  Jay caught an unbelievable rainbow in one of the pools on one of these huge streamers.  This thing was about 5.5 lbs. and was an awesome catch.   With 4 fish for the day and stunning views we had had a trip of a lifetime.  We finally made it back to the hostel at about 9:30 p.m. and were exhausted but still smiling and almost speechless after such an amazing day.  Check out Jay’s Flickr for more pictures of the day.  

Fork in the river

My big rainbow

Beautiful gorge

Jay's big rainbow

After such an awesome day of fishing and being in one of the most beautiful places in the world I have decided that I have to come back someday.  Sam was telling us that when we come back we should do at least a 3 day helli-fishing trip where you have a chance to get on rivers that very few people ever get to.  Hopefully someday I can.  The south island is so beautiful and pure and the whole day we were fishing I kept thinking about how breathtakingly beautiful God’s creation is.  I’m still in awe of the beauty and I’m so thankful that I got the opportunity to go.

The next we chartered a driver to take us to Christchurch where we were flying back to Auckland the next morning at 6:00 a.m.  The drive up to Christchurch was another pretty drive through the mountains.  Our driver was very nice and loved getting to take us 6 hours north to Christchurch.  When we got there we paid to store our bags at the airport and headed in to town.  We were all anxious to see the destruction of the recent earthquakes.  When we got there it felt like a ghost town.  The center of downtown was completely fenced off and there were no people to be found.  We couldn’t actually see much due to the fence, but it was still sad to see such a big city be completely devastated.  We had heard that the insurance companies need 90 days of no seismic activity before they can send adjusters out to completely asses the damage and with regular after shocks happening all of the time everything is pretty stagnant as far as reconstruction is concerned. 

Christchurch is a ghost town

An old church destroyed

We then made our way to a local park where the World Busker’s Festival was being held.  This was a great place for people watching and it was great to see people moving on and trying to boost the morale after such a big disaster.  As it got later we decided to go back to the airport where we would be “spending the night.”  There is an area in the international terminal where backpackers and travelers alike make camp and sleep in the airport for their early morning flights.  It was kind of funny to see so many people sleeping on the floor and it became clearly evident that our group was not prepared to be doing such.  All I had with me were the clothes on my back and some headphones.  A lot of the backpackers had ground pads and sleeping bags which looked much more comfortable that just sleeping on the floor.  I managed to get a few hours of sleep and a sore back before waking up at 4:30 a.m. to go check in. 

We finally made it back to Sydney and arrived back at Wesley College where we had stayed almost a month ago.  Its weird how fast time flies when you’re traveling.  We have 4 days here in Sydney before we come back home.  I’m looking forward to getting to catch up on some schoolwork and finalizing getting contacts for my research before getting back to the states.  Until next time, cheers!