New Zealand, Queenstown: Watching Kiwis Playing Miniature Golf from a Luge

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One of the more anticipated destinations during our month in New Zealand, travelling around in a campervan, was definitely the small town of Queenstown. When we read about the place in our trusty Lonely Planet guidebook, we had this picture-perfect image in our minds of a quaint little town surrounded by beautiful snow-capped mountains and a large, crystal clear blue lake. We weren't disappointed at all and were completely blown away by the scenery when we arrived there. It helped that the weather was gorgeous with a clear blue sky each day we were there, excellent weather that we continued to experience in a country where we had expected cold, rainy and cloudy days during the majority of our trip.

During our time in Queenstown, we didn't take advantage of any of the adventure rides on offer. Mostly, we talked ourselves out of them because of the extortionate prices charged for each activity, but the one that we had considered the most, New Zealand's highest and scariest canyon swing, was booked up and we couldn't get onto that ride. Dan wasn't that upset about not riding the canyon swing, since he had had reservations against the massive free-fall aspect of the ride, from the start of our discussions about it a couple of weeks earlier when we were on the North Island, but Kyle had really been looking forward to the adrenaline rush. One thing we did take advantage of during our time in Queenstown was learning more about native New Zealand birds and wildlife, and Maori culture, by visiting Kiwi Birdlife Park at the edge of the town centre.

So, how long had we been in New Zealand by that point? It had been around 2-1/2 weeks and we had still not seen a kiwi bird in the wild, a goal we had set to accomplish before leaving the country at the end of our month. Since the birds were nocturnal and threatened of being endangered one day, our chances of seeing one "in the wild" were not high, so we opted to visit one of the birdlife parks instead, where a kiwi sighting was guaranteed. We did see a couple of kiwis in the nocturnal houses at Queenstown's wildlife centre; the houses were basically large buildings with very, very dim light inside, like moonlight, just enough light to see the kiwi exhibit once our eyes adjusted to the dark.

1200 years ago, there were as many as 12 million kiwis living in New Zealand, and the numbers today have declined to around 78,000. The species has been threatened primarily because of European settlement of New Zealand's two main islands, and the introduction of several pests that have contributed directly to the decline of the kiwi population. For example, Australian brushtail possums, ferrets, feral cats, rats, stoats and a few other animals find kiwi eggs and their young a tasty meal. Humans are also a cause of the decline in population, due to the reduction in forests to pave the way for roads and farms. Lastly, there aren't kiwi crossing road signs just for fun; kiwis have bad eyesight and cross roads occasionally, becoming road kill for drivers not paying attention to where they are going.

The Australian brushtail possum was probably the worst introduced pest in New Zealand (despite their cuteness, as opposed to the American opossum). The possum population has grown to several million over the years and has been increasing, despite acts put in place to reduce their numbers. The second largest pigeon in the world, New Zealand's native wood pigeon, has also become threatened because the possums in New Zealand eat the exact same diet of fruits and berries as the wood pigeon, and one of the animals will eventually have to win the war for food. Things aren't looking good for wood pigeons, unless something can be done about the possums. We were told one way we could help was to try and run over possums when driving along New Zealand roads and highways; we definitely saw many dead possums on the road, but didn't manage to contribute to their decline, and, sadly, we did hit a few birds during our trip.

In addition to birds at Kiwi Birdlife Park, we saw a few tuataras there. The tuatara was a living dinosaur and has been on earth for 235 million years without evolving one bit. It was incredible to see the native New Zealand reptile, which has lived with the dinosaurs and managed to survive without requiring any changes over time. We were introduced to the tuatara during an informative and entertaining presentation given by one of the rangers inside the park, during which we saw many examples of New Zealand birds, each of which flew back and forth across the enclosure during the presentation so we could take a closer look at them.

The birdlife park was established on a former refuse site and was transformed into a beautiful, natural landscaped park filled with a variety of endangered birds and plant life. All through the park was colourful signage explaining the story of each bird and their individual personalities. We were given an excellent audio guide that we listened to whilst walking around the park; the audio guide explained more about the birds, plants and conservation efforts underway, both by the park itself and across New Zealand. We had a brilliant time at the park and were very happy to have visited it during our time in Queenstown.

Next to Kiwi Birdlife Park, on Brecon Street, was the entrance to the Skyline Gondola and a couple of miniature golf courses. We actually rode the Skyline Gondola on our first afternoon in Queenstown, to take advantage of the excellent weather and clear skies, and decided to visit the birdlife park on our second full day in town. We also played miniature golf on our second day after visiting the park. When we rode the Skyline Gondola up to the summit of a hill, we were granted spectacular views of Queenstown, Lake Wakatipu and the Remarkable Mountains in the distance. It was chilly and cool at the summit, but that didn't stop us riding a luge down the hill a couple of times, advancing from the beginner track to the advanced one after our first downhill race.

The miniature golf course was called Caddyshack City and they had 18 holes of indoor fun. Each hole had a par of 3 or more, with several advanced and intricate features that made it impossible to get a hole-in-one. However, the course was fun and worth the investment, since the game lasted longer than a traditional miniature golf game would have done. Some of the holes had small chairlifts where our balls would ride up a gondola to a mountain peak and then "ski" down several slopes before exiting somewhere else on the course, and others had buildings through which our balls had to travel before popping out the other side in a good spot or bad spot, depending on the path the balls took through the buildings.

The holes at Caddyshack City were cleverly set up, and we liked the fact that we got a free soft drink for playing, and a lollipop on the 18th hole, but we almost wished we would have tried playing at the more traditional outdoor miniature golf course across the street from Caddyshack City. We did try to play there after Caddyshack City, but we had run out of cash and the place didn't take credit cards. With the ATM being too far down a steep hill for us to go there and return back with cash, we gave the second golf course a miss, and no holes-in-one were achieved by us in Queenstown.

The first night we arrived in Queenstown, we had checked into the Top 10 Queenstown Holiday Park and made dinner whilst relaxing in the comfort of our home away from home. That evening, we ate pasta with grilled vegetables and cheese, and we shared a bottle of New Zealand white wine from the Marlborough region, fitting since we were not too far from that region. Other meals that we ate in the campervan included a leftover rice and vegetable dish that we had in our refrigerator, a breakfast of eggs, bacon and toast one day, and a lunch of tortilla wraps with sandwich meat and cheese the next day. We reckon there was another meal, most likely breakfast on the day we left Queenstown, but we didn't write it down and can't remember whether or not we ate then or on the road to Wanaka, our next destination.

In addition to the food we cooked and ate in our campervan, we also ate out a couple of times in Queenstown, so we could sample some of the local fare and see if the cosy little restaurants and cafes lived up to their appearance. For our first lunch in Queenstown, we shared a decent steak sandwich at a cafe close to the Kiwi Birdlife Park, and we enjoyed a couple of coffees there: Kyle had a white chocolate latte and Dan had tea, and we were served by a friendly Irish woman. For dinner on our first full day in town, we found a Mexican restaurant called Sombreros Mexican Cantina and we shared a beef burrito there that was not very good, but we also shared tortilla chips, salsa and guacamole, which were all very tasty.

Besides the two meals, we also had some snacks at Embassy Cinemas when we saw a Kiwi film called "Eagle vs. Shark", a funny comedy set in the 1980's about two strange people who fall in love and are proof that there is someone for everyone. We also saw the political war drama "Lions for Lambs", which was alright, but not at the top of the list of films we have seen this year, even though it had an excellent cast including Tom Cruise, Meryl Streep (she was great, as always), and Richard Gere. Tom Cruise uttering the lines "do you want to win the war on terror" just wasn't convincing for us. Somehow, we also managed to find time in Queenstown to watch a DVD one evening in the campervan, a great dark comedy called "Big Nothing" with David Schwimmer and Simon Pegg, worth lots of laughs.

When we were sitting in a cafe one afternoon, enjoying a couple of glasses of fresh juice, we saw the old couple from Sydney who we had spoken to during the return portion of our TranzAlpine train journey a week earlier. We couldn't be asked to step outside and speak to them, and we just let them walk past the cafe, unaware that we were sitting inside the window. After enjoying our drinks, we walked to a place called Crew to get haircuts; it was situated on the Queenstown Mall pedestrian shopping street.

The final thing we did in Queenstown that requires mentioning was a visit to Sky City Casino, where we played blackjack and enjoyed the additional "Perfect Pairs" rule, where you could bet a little extra and win big if yours two initial cards came up as a match. Despite enjoying the games we played and talking to the dealers and manager, we weren't major winners at the table, unfortunately...

When we left Queenstown, we drove towards the town of Wanaka to visit Puzzling World, something we had read out that sounded a bit quirky. The drive there was through beautiful countryside and over steep and twisty mountain roads. We actually saw another couple that we had spoken to during our TranzAlpine train journey, two people from Dallas who were cycling south along the western coast of the South Island, and who we were shocked to pass on the small country road we took to get to Wanaka from Queenstown.