Day 12 - Heading to Queenstown

We were awoken by the warden, Graham, letting us know that rain was coming down the valley and we may want to pack up our tent.  He knew we were planning to head out that day so it was nice of him to let us know about the rain.  We packed up, had a quick breakfast and headed out.  It was a very windy hike with some mist but we never got too wet.  Since I fell into one of the many creek crossings on the way in, I was very aware of them.  I counted 16!  This time I used my hiking pole and did not fall thankfully.

You can see the rain coming behind me.  

 On our way out, Matt wanted to do a another quick hike that was on the way.  I had no desire to hike uphill so I kept walking back to the trailhead.  He stashed his pack and made a quick hike up the Rob Roy Track.  The wind was really intense and on the swing bridge he had to cross to get to the hike, the wind blew his pack cover off but luckily he caught it before it blew away.

This is the Rob Roy Glacier.

I didn't mention that the last 33 km to the trailhead was gravel and the last 10 km had creeks we had to forge with the Sunny.  It was a little scary because the water was several inches deep in some of them. 

 We headed back to Wanaka and were ready for REAL food.  We stopped for a late breakfast at Cafe Lago.

Matt had something with eggs, sausage, toast, potatoes.  Yum.

My iced coffee.  This time it was like an affogato...basically ice cream with espresso poured over it and some milk I think.  

I had fancy banana french toast.  Deliciously sweet.  I loved their presentation.

 We were staying in Queenstown that evening so we headed down the road and checked into our place for the evening.  It was called Bumbles Backpacker.  This was definitly the most authentic youth hostel-like place we stayed in.  We were probably some of the oldest people staying there.  We had a private room but it was right off one of the dorm rooms.  I think they were near full for the night.  It was in a great location and had great views.  After checking in, we walked around town and stopped for a burger at Fergburger which is a famous burger place.  I think we pretty much balanced out all the calories we had burned off hiking between our breakfast and the huge burger and fries we had for dinner.  We walked around the harbor a little and then headed back ready to sleep in a real bed.  We were thankful for the DOC guy's advice to "seize the good weather".  We were also glad that we had shortened the length if the backpacking trip and changed the route.  I honestly would not have made it on the trip we had originally planned.  The best part of camping in New Zealand - no critters to worry about.  They don't have mice, raccoons, snakes, mountain lions, bears, etc.  They do have some possum that were introduced and plenty of pesky sandflies.  Anyway, I was somewhat inspired to do more backpacking...any suggestions on where we should go here in the States?