May 26, 2014

May 26, 2014

Today we woke up to 4 inches of snow on the ground and a light snowfall. The kids were beyond excited. Connor said it was his first time with snow falling from the sky. He did see snow fall when he was 18 months, but aside from that he is right. The times we have gone to the snow, it hasn’t been snowing. So it was Carolina’s first time with snow falling from the sky too! We didn’t have the right attire for snow, but that didn’t stop us. We bundled up with our rainboots, rain jackets, two pairs of pants, and light gloves to go play in the snow. We made a snowman, threw snowballs, and walked around. By the time we were done, we couldn’t feel our fingers or our toes. We were cold!! 

 

 

Since we didn’t have a warm, cozy house, we didn’t exactly warm up before heading to Queenstown for the day. Our first stop was to get hats and socks. New souvenirs for all! It took a long time for my feet to warm back up and Carolina was the same way. I think she has inherited my poor circulation to the hands and feet. She was pretty miserable for awhile. After we donned our new winter garb, we headed to a cafe to grab some warm drinks and goodies. 

 

While we were sitting on the patio eating it, some Taiwanese students were throwing snow at everyone, including two girls that worked at the cafe. They were getting into a serious snowball fight. The college students would get these big blocks of snow and smash them down the backs of their friends or the employees. In between barrages, I offhandedly told the employee that the girl pelting her must be a really good friend of hers to allow her to do that. The employee told me that she didn’t even know them. They were a tour group and woke up this morning to their first ever glimpse of snow! No wonder that were going crazy with the snow play. I love how snow can turn anyone into a little kid! We finished up our treats (one of which was an Afghan cookie, a treat here in New Zealand, made of chocolate, cornflakes, and nuts. It wasn’t something I would gravitate toward usually but I had to try it before we left.) We headed to a maze that the cafe employees had recommended while we waited for the sky to clear up before going up the gondola. It was a super fun sensory maze. You had to walk in bare feet because the floors were different textures. Each room had different activities. Every other room was pitch black, which Carolina did not care for, but she did well for being scared. Connor loved it. Our favorite room was packed full of giant exercise balls piled three high. We got to climb over them, jump on them, and throw them. There were also rooms with mirrored mazes. After the maze, we headed to the Queenstown Sky Line. This is a gondola that takes you up to the top of one of the mountains surrounding Queenstown. The weather was supposed to clear up, but it never really did. There were lots of grey clouds with snow up at the top of the mountain, but we still got a good idea of what the view would be. Queenstown is considered the outdoor adventure capital of New Zealand so there were options to bungy jump, jump swing, and luge on the the mountaintop. We opted for the luge. It was awesome! I rode with Carolina, and Matt and Connor each got to ride separately. We raced each other down the mountain. Connor tipped over the first time when he turn a sharp turn too quickly, but he was fine. Once we got to the bottom of the run, we took a chair lift back up and did it again. We bought 8 runs so the kids each got to race three times. Then we rode the gondola back down the mountain. 

 

 

Here is a picture of Queenstown in the sun courtesy of a postcard:

We loved Queenstown. It had a fun mountain town vibe to it. I would love to have spent a few days there! I am just happy we made it there at all though with our altered route. We were actually lucky in a way that the roads were closed. Had we made it to Queenstown at the time we originally planned, we would have been looking at the city in the pouring down rain. Since it wasn't raining when we left, we had the luxury of stopping along our drive to snap photos. 

 

After Queenstown, we headed to Lake Tekapo. We hadn’t heard anything about this place from anyone, but there was a tiny little side bar in my guidebook that mentioned an observatory that was one of the best places to look at stars. Since we had a long drive to Christchurch looming, we decided to break it up by staying the night in Lake Tekapo, which was about the halfway point. We decided to do the night tour at the observatory that night. We had forgotten to look it up online the night before so we drove to the little village in hopes that there was a tour office there. There was! Matt rushed in to get tickets since we didn’t know what time the tour started. I jumped out after Matt and heard the employee telling Matt the disappointing news that they were sold out. He said that if we had booked early that afternoon, we would have gotten tickets. We had tried the entire drive, but had no service. It would have cost over $300 for us to do the tour. Matt says he wouldn’t have paid that much money anyway, but I secretly think he would have. We found out that Lake Tekapo is one of the best places in the world to observe the stars. It would have been amazing to use high powered telescopes to look at the stars and planets. The kids might have been bored out of their minds, but Matt and I would have loved it. So we had to settle with viewing the stars with our eyes alone. Spectacular and stunning are words that don’t even do this star gazing justice. The stars danced in the sky like diamonds flashing in the sun. Who would have thought that the sky could look crowded?! Tekapo is a dark night protected zone so there are hardly any lights around. A local told us to drive to the local church on the lake and view the stars from there so we did. It was majestic! The clearness of the Milkyway was unrivaled to anything I have ever seen. We spotted Mars and Jupiter easily just by looking at their colors. It was a night sky without comparison. It seemed like we were sitting in a planetarium, but we were out in a field. There was no moon, either, which made the sky seemed brighter too. We then drove out to the local airport where there was no one else and no view of any lights from any houses and sat in a field and looked at the stars. Connor, Carolina, and I each saw a shooting star. It was a frigid night so the kids were ready to thaw out after our second round of star gazing. Matt and I both commented that this night sky was something that will be etched in our memories. Trying to put what we saw in words doesn’t come close to allowing anyone to visualize what we were lucky enough to experience!