Epic New Zealand Road Trip - Queenstown

Feb 11th
There were coffee and tea in the room for us this morning. We got up early to head out toward Queenstown. Today Liên and I were going to do bungee jumping and then Debbie would join us in ziprides. Liên insisted I’d bungee jump with her and had sent me links to videos. The videos looked so scary. Every time I thought about New Zealand, I thought about being upside down, held in the air by a rope, jerked up and down - that didn’t quite give me the thrills. But then I decided I was going to embrace the experience. There was no sense to do it otherwise. 

We got to the AJ Hackett Bungy Company early. We enjoyed the view on the Kawarau Gorge Suspension bridge where we’d take the plunge from 141 feet above the Kawarau River. Before long, we were processed, weighed, interviewed, videotaped, prepped, and were the first pair to jump. We were very happy to be able to jump in tandem. Being upside down, it seemed to me as if we were falling toward the bridge at the point where we were being pulled back up. But everything happened so fast, I felt disoriented. Liên giggled the whole time, even after it ended and we were safely in the boat. This was the highlight of the trip for me, bungee jumping with Liên in such a beautiful setting. 

Liên wanted to go upside down on the ziprides. Debbie and I paired up and sat side by side. It was a short ride, but it was so fun, especially when we got to turn around and go back. It was cool that we had pictures of all three of us together. 

The adrenaline thrills of the morning inspired all three of us to sign up for paragliding at 4100 feet, scheduled for the early evening. We had several hours to spare and decided to hike the Queenstown Hill trail. I thought it’d be a piece of cake to do a 2-hour hike of this trail with “gentle gradient and stunning scenery.” Stunning scenery it gave us, but not so gentle gradient! The hill was steep and it was a hard hike.

After the hike, we got our room and refreshed ourselves before heading out for paragliding, but it was cancelled due to weather. We went out for dinner, visited Odyssey Sensory Maze, watched the gulls, and tried out the Below Zero Ice Bar.

I can imagine myself living in Queenstown and conquering the Queenstown Hill trail.