With numerous young people walking the streets with skis on their shoulders, a case of beer under their arms, and flip flops on their feet, it's a place that says I'm the gateway to various extreme sports¹ or a very good place to get your drunk on.
Thursday
2:28 pm
Completed the placement of the rental car keys in the Budget drop box after successfully completing our 1600-mile multi-island New Zealand road trip odyssey.
2:29 pm
Celebrated the placement of the rental car keys in the Budget drop box after successfully completing our 1600-mile multi-island New Zealand road trip odyssey, at Toast & Oak with #AARSaivignonBlancOclock. While I really don't know a damn thing about wine, I love drinking it while more knowledgeable others talk about it using terms such as terroir, minerality, and schist.
3:21 pm
According to some, one of the most epic things to do in Queenstown is to walk the waterfront and have a drink at Perky's Floating Bar. Its signage states "Boat Stays in the Jetty - Permanently Moored" as I guess this is a concern for those wanting cheap drinks and fine views of Lake Wakatipu.
3:55 pm
After depositing Mrs. AAR back at the hotel for a bath in the finest bathroom she has bathed in since we spent a night at the InterContinental San Francisco, I took a turn around the town to get the lay of the land, some steps and some bread, cheese and an orange at the Four Square, the only legitimate grocery store downtown.
4:14 pm
Stopped by the Village Green to read about how the Queenstown early days were dominated by gold mining. It made me wonder what those gold miners would think about today's Queenstown. Though I'm sure they would appreciate all the bars and all the yoga pants.
4:29 pm
Visited the 11th best thing to do in Queenstown, the Queenstown Mall.² It’s a very nice outdoor mall. Not sure if it should be ranked higher than Buzzstop (“Queenstown’s home for all things Bees and Honey”), as I'm thinking, both could be equally snooze-inducing.
4:39 pm
Walked through the Memorial Arch. As with most New Zealand towns, there is a monument dedicated to those who perished in a war fought on the other side of the world whilst defending not their homes but their ideals.
8:32 pm
Ask anyone in Queenstown for a dinner recommendation and they will mention Fergburger. So much so that it seems a little weird, though when I heard Ed Sheeran believes that it's "By far the best burger in the world," it got my attention. Normally there can be an hour wait, so I figured we'd cruise by and if the line was too long, we'd give it the go-bye.
Well, I’m thankful the line was short, as according to Mrs. AAR "Oh. . . My . . . God!" And I have to agree, possibly the best burger I ever ate. Maybe it's the handmade NZ beef patties, the handmade sauces, or the fresh baked bread, but then again who . . . . cares. And when washed down by a Rippon Osteiner³ back at the room, maybe even a little sublime.
Friday
9:19 am
A hearty breakfast at Tamarind by No5 Church Lane. Now normally I'm not a hearty breakfast kind of guy, but I needed to fortify myself for scaling a mountain later on that morning. Well, that and that the hotel came with breakfast included, and if I don't get that second side order of bacon, I feel like I'm getting gypped.
11:07 am
There are two options for summiting Bob's Peak:
Skyline Queenstown, which for $40 USD will take you to the top and back via gondola.
The Tiki Trail which is a rather basic trail that takes an hour and half to elevate you 450 meters.
Since the weather was quite cloudy I didn't want to risk the anguish of paying $40 USD to reach the top only to discover cloud-obscured views, so the Tiki Trail it was. While described by the internet as "Difficulty: Moderate," I would not recommend this trail to anyone older than say fifty-eight and a half years old, as parts of it are quite raw with it seemingly disappearing at one point. Also, the signs that say "Danger Tree Felling In Progress" didn't make it feel any easier.
The top is like the top of all gondola, funicular, cable car termini: A soulless obtrusive modern building that just seems out of place. One that contains great views and one of those machines that smooshes a coin with an imprint that says "Skyline Queenstown."
I took the compacted gravel access road back down as it was beginning to drizzle and I didn't want to ride down on my ass.
6:30 pm
The bartender from Perky's mentioned that Flame was a nice restaurant and when I realized they served Mozambique prawns I knew I had to go in order to compare them to the ones I ate in Maputo back in 2018 and to allow me to mention my Maputo AAR.
The prawns delivered to me at the bar in a scalding cast iron pan were very good, with the perfect snap and a delicious coconut sauce, but paled in size with the nuclear ones I had previously eaten at the Zambi Restaurant in Maputo. I spoke with the manager who assured me his prawns were imported from Mozambique, though I still think it’s all a little suspect.
8:45 pm
As we were heading back to the ranch I noticed a sign for green-lipped muscles, which is a species of mollusk that can only be found in New Zealand, so I figured we'd have some one last time at the Captain's Table accompanied by a Marlborough Sauvignon blanc.
As we were departing for Melbourne the next day, it could have been a very nice way to say goodbye to New Zealand until I noticed they charged me $9 USD for a bottle of still water and $9 USD for my Sauvignon blanc. It made me realize that I needed to start reviewing the menu a little more carefully, and more importantly, start drinking more wine and less water.
Saturday
9:00 am
An even better way to say goodbye to New Zealand was the included breakfast at our hotel's sister restaurant, The Grille by Eichardt's, which offered me two eggs over easy, all the trimmings, and beautifully foggy lake views. Then an Uber to the airport for a flight to Melbourne.
Lodgings
The Spire Hotel Queenstown ($250/night) is one of those hotels where there literally is a front desk, one that is unobtrusively placed in the corner of the lobby with a well dressed gent seated behind it who greets you by your name. A place so nice, your room doesn't have a number, but a name, The Laneway Suite. All that and an Eames Lounge Chair & Ottoman. A restful place after completing our South Island road trip.
It didn't register on my day prior Expedia.com search for Queenstown lodgings, most likely because of its price, but subsequently, they must have (drastically) reduced it, and voilà we are staying in the best hotel in Queenstown.
Well, I guess there is always a catch: The Laneway Suite is located just across a pedestrian alley from a nightclub, so it was a little loud at night. It didn't help that the Snow Machine music festival was in town. I think it's named as such because a snow machine is very loud.
Endnotes: I wanted to provide some very specific details that while vaguely interesting did not contribute to the overall narrative. Perhaps just wait until the end to enjoy.
¹ In 1988, New Zealander, A. J. Hackett, opened the world's first permanent commercial bungee site, the Kawarau Bridge Bungy at the Kawarau Gorge Suspension Bridge near Queenstown.
² I can't believe people waste their time reviewing a shopping mall on TripAdvisor.
³ Osteiner is a German grape variety created by crossing a Riesling and Silvaner. In the 21st century, only a few Osteiner vineyards are left in Germany. According to Wikipedia "the most notable Osteiner wine today is made by Rippon Vineyards in Central Otago, New Zealand, which displays grapefruit flavors with good sugars and acidity, and is described as a well-balanced white wine for summer."
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