Queenstown

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We had been constantly told about how Queenstown was the highlight of the trip, with its late-opening bars, big activities, and even skiing and snow-boarding, so it was going to be great to finally arrive and have a good time!

On the drive down, we were going to stop at the Kawarua bridge, where the first bungy jump in New Zealand was set up by AJ Hackett. This is a 43m drop over the river, and you jump from a suspended bridge. I had been looking forward to bungie jumping here, and decided to give it a go (!). A load of people from the bus went too, Will, Josh, Martha, and Heidi and Signie decided to jump once they were there too. Even Barton got in on the action !

Kawarua bridge bungie, end of bus dinner

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I headed up onto the bridge, to get strapped in for the bungy. The kit they used was not high-tech in any way ! They just wrapped a towel around your legs while they were together, and then wrapped some kind of climbing cord around the towel. This was then attached to the bungy itself (all while you sat down), and then the bloke told you to shuffle over to the ledge.

This was definitely the most scary part for me, shuffling out over this tiny ledge, looking down at a 43m drop. I told the bloke I wanted to splash into the water a little bit, and then I shuffled so my toes were just overhanging the ledge. He told me to wave at the camera, and then across at the guys watching me, actually I felt really precarious hanging around for that long. He counted me down '5-4-3-2-1-bungie !', and I just jumped as far as I could out into the river.

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After what seemed like ages, the cord started to pull tight, and slow me down. I bounced back up again, which was really disorienting, as I couldn't really see where I was going! After a few more bounces, I was lowered to the rescue dinghy, and they unhooked the bungie. I was really buzzing after that, I couldn't stop shaking !

After we got into Queenstown, and booked my other activities while I was here (I decide to fit as much as possible in, and have one less day in Christchurch on the way back so I could have a quiet day to chill out in). We all went out for a meal after that, which was a really good laugh, but a bit bittersweet at the same time, as people were filtering off once we were in Milford to different places. It felt like an end-of-term dinner !