8/5/12 – Queenstown, New Zealand
I tried to put the jetlag behind me after arriving
yesterday morning following 30+ hours of flying from Nice, France. I think the adrenaline helped keep me
awake and kicking as we made our descent into Queenstown, NZ between a very
NARROW mountain passage way…
Tommy and I went to a Travelers Convention in Melbourne
about 3 months ago to try and find some great travel deals, and were lucky
enough to find a week-long Backpackers Ski Group package to Queenstown, NZ
called the Ski Express. We got off
the quick flight from Melbourne to Queenstown, and were greeted by Sophie and
Sally, our two young and fun ski/group guides. We were sent off on our own to check into our first
Backpackers ever, and to pick up all of our ski gear, bus passes and lift
tickets for the week. I have to
say for our first Backpackers, this was not bad at all! The location was perfect, right in the
center of town, but I must admit that we opted to pay a little extra for a
double room rather than sharing a room with 14 other people…
After collecting all of the skiing necessities and
exploring the quaint town, the whole group met up in what would become our
nightly meeting point, Old Man’s Pub.
This was a great spot where we could get a few beers and some free nibbles
after a long day of skiing, and catch up with the rest of the group! Because it was our first night, we had
a huge Welcome Dinner at a great pizza spot that turned pretty sloppy and silly
right away. I was honestly trying
to keep my face from planting straight into the pizza in front of me because I
was so exhausted, but the Irish boys in the group did not seem to notice and
instead kept placing beer after shot after beer in front of me! Luckily they did not see me pouring
most of these back into the pitcher, as I did not want to have a rough first
day on the slopes!
8/6/12 – Coronet Peak
Fear set in as we climbed higher and higher up the
mountain for our first day of skiing.
This would only be my 4th ski trip ever, two of which were when I was in
elementary school, so you can see why I was a bit nervous to hit the
slopes! To my great luck we were
starting off at Coronet Peak, also known as the iciest mountain in the region. Lovely.
I am happy to say that my first few runs went really well
on the “bunny slope” getting my groove back, and quickly progressing up the
mountain to the Blue (intermediate) runs.
Well, after a few Blue runs, my confidence was growing, but a cloud was
quickly moving to block the sun and turn the ice level up a couple notches! I started racing down a pretty steep
slope that had become very icy, and quickly hit an ice patch and lost a
ski. As I sat down on the slope
trying to get my ski back on, I started to slide down the icy slop on my bum,
knocking the ski down the hill as I tried to get my fingers to grip into the
ice to stop me skiing down the rest of the slope on my belly. Now I must have been quite the site to
see, sliding down the slope on my belly with only one ski on, poles flying out
to the side, and yelling “SOMEBODY HELP ME!” at the top of my lungs… Luckily I finally stopped belly surfing
down the slope and had a nice snowboarder come to the rescue to help me stand
up, and wait for Tommy to hike up to me with my ski. By the time he reached me he was dripping sweat and panting
from hiking up the steep slope, and I was SO OVER skiing. Unfortunately I still had to get the
ski back on and make it down the rest of the mountain. Well after 15 minutes of crying, panicking,
and trying to get the ski back on without both of us sliding down the icy
slope, it finally all came together.
My wobbly legs made it all the way to the base without falling, thank
gosh, but I had made up my mind that I was never going to ski again. Probably not the best time to decide
this, day 1 of a weeklong ski trip…
I am proud to say that after warming up with a hot cocoa,
I decided to get back on the slopes and face my fears. By the end of the day I was sore,
tired, emotionally drained, BUT ready to ski the next day! Tommy was thrilled that I had not given
up just yet.
For dinner tonight we went to the famous Fergberger, home
to the best burgers in New Zealand!
We both enjoyed the Cockadoodle-Oink Burger.
8/7/12 – Cadrona Mountain
We skied Cadrona today, which was much better than
Coronet! The slopes were nice and
wide with lots of powder from the big dump over night! We had an absolute blast here taking in
the amazing views and trying some of the harder runs.
We stopped at the famous Cadrona Pub on the way home for a
nice cold beer to finish a great day!
8/8/12 – Milford Sound
Today was our one-day off from skiing to break up the week
so we decided to do a Milford Sound tour, New Zealand’s most famous tourist
destination. We were picked up at
5am in the morning to make the long 4-hour drive to the Milford Sound, but boy was
it worth it! We entered Fiordland
National Park early on, and loved taking in the spectacular views through the
mountains passes in our glass top tour bus. The highlight of the tour was our cruise through the Milford
Sound. The Milford Sound is a
fjord in the south west of New Zealand’s South Island. A fjord is a long, narrow inlet with
steep sides created in a valley carved by glacial activity. We were surrounded by 4,000-foot cliffs
on either side of us leading out to the Tasman Sea. Many parts of these cliffs had stunning waterfalls pounding
down from them, one that we actually got to stand under called Lady Bowen
Falls. The Milford Sound is one of
the wettest places in the world, the wettest in New Zealand, so we were lucky
to have a beautiful day free from rain!
I cannot even attempt to describe the beauty we witnessed, so instead I
will let you enjoy a few of our pictures.
8/9/12 – The Remarkables
Today we went to a new mountain called The
Remarkables. We got a huge snow
dump overnight presenting us with fresh powder covering the entire
mountain. There were some really
great and tough runs that we did to warm up before venturing off the cleared
paths. We hiked up the side of the
mountain to attempt to ski the fresh untouched powder, which ended in a huge
snowball rolling down the hill.
The snowball was me… We
were not aware that under this lovely fresh THICK powder was pure ice
impossible to quickly turn on, so of course when I made my first turn, down I
went. As soon as I got back up, I
attempted another turn and ended up flying down the mountain with my bambi legs
kicking in the air, skis on and all.
Another lovely site for everyone to witness. Well I did not feel so bad after I watched Tommy (THE PRO)
follow right in my footsteps and tumble down the slope. Not our best idea. We decided to stick to the black
diamonds already paved out for us for the most part of the day. We did do one last challenging run with
our ski group. We all hiked up to
the very tipity-top of the Remarkables mountain where the most spectacular views
awaited. Now we were warned that
only the advanced skiers should bring their skis up to ski down through the
rocky straight down slope of the tip rather than hiking back down. Of course I could not decide what to do
and ended up being convinced by Tommy to just bring my skiis up in case. Well once I saw what I was
supposed to be skiing down I quickly said, “HELL NO!” Of course there was no way I was hiking all the way back
down with my skis so I decided to suck it up and give it a go. I am very proud to say I made it down
without a hitch, a bit slower pace than Tommy, but I made it! This was my first double black ever,
and it was well worth the try! No
big deal…
8/10/12 – Cadrona Mountain
We decided to go back to Cadrona for our last day of
skiing, our favorite mountain! We
spent the entire day riding all of the blacks, and even did a few double blacks
off the side of the mountain. Once
again I went down about as slow as a snail, but I am proud to say I felt like a
pro…until I watched the videos of the pigeon toed girl slowly turning down a
very steep slope. We had the
absolute best day together, and did not want to stop skiing when it was time to
head back to town! I’d say that
was a big improvement from the first day when I declared that I would NEVER ski
again!
We finished the trip on a very fun note with our group PUB
CRAWL! Because we were so busy
skiing, we did not meet a lot of the people in our group, and found out that
they had been referring to us as Bill and Hillary because we are American. So tonight we were Bill and Hillary
Clinton gone wild. A few key words
of the night: bull riding, money shots, dancing, karaoke, Irish boys, more
money shots, the Hangover New Zealand style, and a whole lot of FUN!
8/11/12 – Queenstown to Melbourne
We were sad to end such an amazing trip today because we
truly had such a fun time! We
actually flew back to Melbourne with the Irish boys on our trip, and it felt
like I was in the movie The Hangover hearing the stories and looking through
the pictures…I will leave the details to your imaginations but lets just say it
was not pretty!
Cheers to an amazing holiday to hopefully be repeated next
year!
This was the perfect opportunity for us to escape the city
and refresh my left-side-of-the-road driving skills. We decided to visit the quaint little town of Bowral, just
over an hour down south from Sydney.
Unexpectedly the weekend really turned into a foodie holiday. We explored every hidden café in town,
our favorite being the Elephant Café, with the most delicious sandwich I have
ever tasted, so delicious that we had to come back for brekkie the next
morning! The hot cocoa was even
better! 
On Sunday we spent the entire day on a wine tasting tour,
exploring the beautiful rolling hills around the town. These were beautiful boutique wineries,
one in which we were lucky enough to try some fresh made mead. What better way to end the day than
with some more delicious tastes on the tongue? We had dinner at Biota, a gastronomy restaurant with a set
tasting menu. It was an incredible
meal, and one bite of the lamb dish nearly brought Tommy to tears. 
