Travelogue (Part 2)

This is the second part of the travelogue. The first part covered up to Te Anau.

Tuesday: Te Anau--Wanaka

This is mainly a driving day. Going back the same route from which we reached Te Anau, we drove to Frankton (a suburb just outside Queenstown) for lunch, before proceeding to Wanaka.

We decided to drive to Wanaka through Crown Range, which is the shorter route to Wanaka. Erica (who had to be our driver or else she gets sick) enjoyed very much the Initial D-like conditions on the road up the range.

Much of the time at Wanaka was spent walking around the town (codeword for shopping), and finalising bookings for the next part of our trip. Indian was the order of the day.

Wednesday: Wanaka

Wednesday started off with a lot of kayaking in Lake Wanaka. We kayaked from the jetty at Wanaka to Ruby Island some kilometres from the lakefront, against the prevailing wind, which made things much more difficult. The trip back was not easy either---the kayaks were slightly too light to take advantage of the waves generated by the wind. All in all, it was good exercise, and we were generally sore all over afterwards.

The afternoon was spent at Puzzling World. We felt intelligent that day:

  • We managed to walk through a 1.5 kilometre, two-level maze, under the "challenging" difficulty setting, in 50 minutes. This is compared to a "typical" solution being found in 60--90 minutes, according to the sign at the entrance of the maze.

  • Keith managed to solve the block puzzle.

Dinner consisted of a reheated pie bought from the supermarket.

Observation

So far on this journey we have stayed at various establishments, ranging to backpacker hostels to bed and breakfasts. By this stage it is evident that there are multiple types of backpackers, and multiple types of backpacker hostels.

Firstly, there are the "really budget" backpackers who tend to party hard well into the early hours of the morning. They rely on various bus or shuttle services to get them around to places, and join activities which offers transport to and from whey they are staying. We met them in Queenstown, where we stayed at a hostel without off-site parking.

Then there are the "less budget" backpackers. They have their own rental vehicles and so can visit places less frequented by the "really budget" backpackers. They tend to be less rowdy, presumably because they realised that in order to survive on the roads, they need to sleep. We met them in Wanaka, where we stayed at a hostel with off-site parking. Note that this hostel is no more expensive than the Queenstown one though.

The next part of the travelogue covers the glaciers.

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Travelogue (Part 1)
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Travelogue (Part 3)

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