Post IX: Shotover River and Glenorchy

The next morning I woke up at 5 A.M to watch … the Patriots Game!!! Pretty funny watching the game in New Zealand and seeing the sunrise over the mountains here. After a nerve wracking but very successful game we started our day! The first activity was jet boating on the Shotover River. Going anywhere in New Zealand is such a pleasure because the drives are beautiful. 

Pano!

 But back to Jet boating. Basically you get in this boat that is powered through jet propulsion (takes in water and blasts it out the back) and shoot down the river. The Shotover River jet boat is especially fun because you wind through this canyon. Throughout the ride we would do full 360’s where the driver would start going one direction and then cut it back sharply causing the boat to spin all the way around. Quite the adrenilne rush. At times it got a bittttt cold as the water was a chilly 6 degrees Celsius (around 43 degrees?) and the wind didn’t help. Actually got a legitimate brain freeze at one point, but it was all part of the fun. It’s pretty amazing because the boat is able to go over really shallow parts, as shallow as 4 inches! All in all, a great way to start the day. 

The air in New Zealand just feels so clean, so we felt really refreshed and clean when we got off the boat. After a delicious meal of meat pies to warm us up we headed down to Glenorchy for a more scenic jet boat and a walk through a forest. Glenorchy is one of the main places they used to film The Lord of the Rings and it’s pretty easy to understand why. Just breathtaking.

Pretty epic waterfall.

Pano!

Pano!

Pano!

 Once again the sun started fading in and out so this ride was especially cold. After about an hour of jetting along the river we were pretty relieved to hop out. 

To warm up we went on a quick walk around this forest.

 My mom kept trying to do a New Zealand accent, but it kept coming out Scottish so we had a good laugh over that. (For the record, other than the New Zealand accent, she is quite good at doing imitations.) After a full day we began the drive back to Queesntown. On the ride back the sun popped out and the sky became this beautiful blue. 

Not to be a broken record here, but the driving in New Zealand has to be the prettiest I have ever seen.

With views like this on the right, you can understand why.

 Upon returning to the hotel after a delicious Italian meal (pizza with prawn and buffalo mozzarella and spaghetti with sausage in an eggy cream sauce) we found out that Qantas had found and delivered my mom’s bag! Hooray!!!