Wanaka - Skydive Strike 2

The fates are conspiring against me, of this I'm now certain.

When we left Franz Josef, our driver Bods passed around the signup sheet for doing a skydive in Wanaka. He told us that, with the weather as it was, there was almost no chance to do it that day, but there was a very slim chance that we could do it the following morning before leaving Wanaka, so three of us put our names on the sheet and crossed our fingers.

As we drove south, the weather steadily improved until, when we stopped for lunch, the clouds were few and far between, and the sun was shining down. As we drove to Wanaka, Bods informed us that he'd spoken with the Skydive people, and they were ready to take us when we arrived in Wanaka at 4pm. So we got off the bus when we arrived (at around 3.45pm) and hung around outside the hostel to be picked up.

At 3.55pm it started raining.

*sigh*

We were told that there was no way for us to do it then, but possibly the next morning if the weather picked up.

I awoke the next morning to torrential rain.

*sigh*

So Franz Josef - strike 1. Wanaka - strike 2. However, on writing this, I sit in Queenstown with a skydive booked for tomorrow afternoon (Friday). We are forecast for torrential rain on Saturday (when I'm supposed to be doing another Lord of the Rings tour - although not subjecting Naomi to it this time!), but I have no idea of the weather for tomorrow.
(I've just looked on the NZ Met Office site, and it looks like it'll be dry but with thickening clouds, and that might be enough for it not to happen, so keep your fingers crossed for me!)

Assuming it all goes to plan, I should be jumping some time between 1.30 and 3.30pm local time (that's around 12.30 - 2.30am UK time).

Anyway, onto other things.

We arrived in Queenstown yesterday, stopping on the way at the original Bungy site where quite a number of people on our bus proceeded to tie elastic to their ankles and throw themselves head-first (usually) off a bridge. Skydiving is one thing, but I don't think I am all that fussed about doing a Bungy. Have to say, though, watching them all do it made it seem like an awful lot of fun...
(Don't worry guys, I haven't forgotten about the videos I took of you all! I'll have them up on the video section of my site when I get home! No promises about the quality of the video, but I've done my best!)

Queenstown itself is quite nice, although smaller than I expected. As one of the guys on the bus commented, it does heavily resemble a ski resort. There seem to be loads of activities to do here, and I suspect the town relies very heavily on the tourist trade to keep its economy going.

We're staying at the Lakefront YHA, and I have to say that its probably one of the better YHAs we've stayed in. All of the YHAs have been good, and we've been very happy on the whole. Wellington has been the best one so far (although lacking a tv in the room, which some had). Queenstown probably rates as number 2, other than the size of the room (we have a double, and the room is only slightly bigger than the double bed in it!).

We spent today being lazy - its our first lie-in since Wellington, so we made the most of it! We wandered around town (Naomi was very good and didn't even do much shopping!).

We kept bumping into people we had met on other Kiwi buses (buses other than the one we had arrived in Queenstown on). Its really great to catch up with people and find out what they've been up to, especially as (in at least one case) we hadn't seen them since we left Taupo in the North Island around two weeks ago (I think - I've kinda lost track of time, I must admit!).

Anyway, the next couple of days are going to be pretty interesting for me, and very relaxing for Naomi (other than worrying about me killing myself in the Skydive!), so I'll probably post again before we leave for Christchurch on Monday morning.