Wanaka 1st January 2009

Our arrival in Wanaka was a little damp, but we had a great time here later. There had been a dismal rainstormy drive through what was purported to be some of the most amazing scenery in the country. (The bottom quarter of the mountains was beautiful, all else was cloud!) When we finally arrived at Lake Wanaka in the early afternoon, we were confident of finding a good campsite or something as we had everywhere else. We needed cheering up, so we squandered our afternoon in "puzzling world" on the outskirts of town, where we lost ourselves, (quite literally) in mazes, optical illusions and puzzles for hours. It was great, but when we finally rolled into town around dusk, we were a little surprised to find that it was completely booked out. As a hiking resort town, there were only really the two extremes of accommodation and we couldn’t afford the luxury end, so it was the grand tour of Wanaka’s hostels for us. It is worth mentioning that hostels in New Zealand (and for that matter in Australia too) are fab. Absolutely head and shoulders above the European average. They normally are clean and businesslike, with laundry and cooking facilities, and most have some huge central common room for hanging out in. Oh and they are called „Backpackers” by the way. E.g. „I stayed in this great little backpackers in Melbourne.” Through some really world-class pleading, Dorka managed to convince a hostel/backpackers manager to bump a reservation (looked like they were never going to show anyhow) and give us a room. It was tiny, noisy, freezing but much more comfy than the car, which had seemed to be our most likely place to stay at that point. With the hostel as our base, we explored the lake, ate subway sandwiches by the shore (ate half, dropped half) and planned our hike for the next day. All our plans were cancelled when we realised the next day(after bumping down a rough track for 20 km of rough track) that the trailhead was still another 10 km away, but we would need a 4x4 to cross a river to continue. We sadly jolted our way back down the bumpy 20km, but soon afterwards, as it was actually sunny and dry for a change, we decided to stop and try a short hill walk. It turned out to be a heavy hike of around 4 hours that took us to the summit of Rocky Mountain, which had fantastic views over the lake, and featured lots of pretty hillside meadows a la „sound of Music”. Dorka provided the comic relief on the way down by falling over spectaularly three times in about 3 minutes, the last time she actually rolled right through a hedge (Thank goodness, no injuries were sustained, as Lara had just been moved and put on my back!)
All in all, this was one of our favourite walks, and perhaps one of our favourite days of the entire trip. It was bitterly cold at the top but there were great views. As we walked we told stories and messed around and generally enjoyed being together. Lara was in the Liliputi backpack carrier for several hours and loved it, Emma was collecting stones (shown, right, by order) and was full of fun, and Dorka was full of bruises, but triumphant, so we were all happy. I'm not sure how much of all that comes across in photos, but we took a million snapshots that day - here are some of the highlights.