Backpaddock Lakes - Lakes at the Back of a Paddock #mindblown

Wind farm viewing platform, nailed it

The drive over I was worried Sinbad was going to be a problem but he did just fine. I stopped into a place called Palmerston North and got some stuff that the mechanic said would help Sinbad if he got sensitive again. It rained but I did have a couple of scenic stops, including a special viewing platform to see the wind turbines, first time for everything. Imagine if we had those in England. I arrived into Waipukurau and it was raining so I decided to stay in the campsite for the night and then call Trev (guy in charge of the lake) in the morning. The campsite was expensive for what they offered, had a chilled out evening and then the next day it was nice and sunny so called up Trev and he told me there was a guy called Tristan in the house at the top of the road who was in charge of the lake.

Beautiful

Tristan was pretty cool so we hung out then went down to check out the lake. It is man-made, took a long ass time to dig up and then filled from underground springs. There is one boat lake and another cable lake with two System 2 style cables (also homemade), an impressive feat in engineering. Tristan showed me how everything worked and then we went for a wakeboard. Then Trev and family came home and we hung out down by the lake, had a BBQ.

I then pulled Sinbad up by the lake and went to sleep, there was no light pollution so I could open the sunroof and looked up at the sky. It was the first time I had seen that many stars in the sky, it was beautiful.

The next few days were spent by the lake hanging out with Tristan in the sun. There were a number of awesome riders that would come down and ride. I landed my first Raley, technically what I did was called a Galey because I cheated and used the pull from the corner but it was awesome to be able to try new stuff. One day Tristan had a lesson with a young girl called Sam and her parents had just bought a Nautique G23, for the record it is like a tank. I was lucky enough to get a ride on it in exchange for taking some photos, good trade I think. It has a huge wake and even in this lake which is shallower it still kicks you up in the air. 

I took a lot of photos so you have to put up with clicking through them now…

The slalom course gets a lot of action

This is a G23 (or boat tank as it is commonly referred)

Marcus carving round a bouy

Sam wakesurfing behind the G23

Ollie, Eva and Trev playing on a "biscuit"

Hoochie Cole as he is known

Sam throwing a Raley

Tristan playing on his board

Tom proving that not all kneeboarding is stupid

I thought I should take a trip in Sinbad into town to make sure he was working, oh I’m glad I did, he got a little warm on that trip. Fortunately Trev is a mechanic so he took Sinbad with him to work and got one of the other guys to clean him up good. One evening Tristan and I decided that we wanted to go watch The Hobbit and what better place to watch it that where it was made. At the start of the movie there was an intro thanking New Zealand, it made me feel involved with the making of the movie. Unfortunately I am bad luck with cars and Tristan’s car might have exploded a little bit when we got to the movies. So Trev came out and literally swapped cars whilst we were watching the movie, haha. The Waipuk cinema is something a little different to any other cinema I’ve been to. It is like a school theatre with the wooden arms, it was an experience like no other. But a good one none the less. 

Shooting stuff

A couple of days before I left I helped Tristan with a Stag Do, they came down and did a lot of wakeboarding. We also had a clay pigeon shoot so got to fire some rounds into the lake, always a blast, see what I did there? After that the guys were going on a pub crawl with Tristan as their chauffeur, we had to pick Sinbad up from the garage first and then I joined in the excitement. Without going into too much detail there were some international drinking competitions and let’s just say that England came home with gold. You are welcome England!

An awesome place to spend a few days, thanks to the Rowlands for having me.

Woodie’s Wisdom: 5 nights sleeping by a lake does wonders for the soul.

Queenstown - Dream Town

Firstly I want to apologize to my avid fans for the delay in updating my blog, I have been having lots of fun. The good news is that you get to read about it, probably when I get back to the UK, ha. Enjoy.

I arrived in civilization and it was amazing! My first stop was to the backpackers where I was told I could park. Unfortunately they didn’t have any space, retrospectively that was a good thing because they charged a fortune, when you live in your own house $5 here and there is important, remember that. I eventually found a very nice campsite and set up home, made friends with the girl behind the desk, let’s call her Hayley from Burnley. 

This is Queenstown, pretty pretty

Then I made my way into town, I can’t really explain the feeling of arriving here. Given that I had come from Invercargill and other places where people were the exception. Having people around doing stuff was fantastic and I immediately felt at home. Being traditionally English I saw a sign that said “pub” and I was caught. I went in and made my first friend in Queenstown, the barman, also from England. There was a trend emerging, there aren’t actually that many people from New Zealand that live in Queenstown, lots of foreigners working and traveling. At The Pub I walked outside on a beautiful afternoon, sat down next to a group of 3 who were eating what can only be described as poo. Fortunately it didn’t taste like it and they were very friendly. After politely asking if they wanted to be my friends they said yes, who wouldn’t! We had some beers and then went to the movies to watch The Hunger Games. It was a good first day.

A sign from my breakfast spot

The next day was what have started to referring to as “American Football Day”, most people call it Monday. I started out with a visit to Hayley to book some activities. I decided to start small and booked some white water rafting for Tuesday. I spent about 7 hours in a bar called Malbas watching the games, it was an awesome day and made friends with the people who were coming for job interviews. Obviously I looked like a secret owner who wanted to get to know the staff. I also had some of the best wings I have had, unfortunately they didn’t have BBQ sauce, who does that?!

My attempt at a pre-rafting selfie

A paddle high five

Tuesday morning I had a wander around a bit of Queenstown village before I got picked up for rafting. It’s a very pretty tourist town, there are so few Kiwis around. So many British people working in all the shops and activity centres. For those that haven’t been, it comes across like a ski resort but is equally busy in both winter and summer. The drive to the rafting start was sketchy, on a road that wasn't really wide enough for the bus. One turn it felt like we were at the end of The Italian Job. My rafting group ended up being 4 English people and 2 Hollandish people, it's like they put the Europeans together. It was the most fun rafting I’ve done. I was sitting at the front so was the first to get a face full of icy fresh water. My favorite part was going through a tunnel followed by a huge drop of rapids. A great rush and who doesn’t love getting sprayed in the face! After I returned to town I went and entered a poker tournament that I had heard about the day before. It was really good fun and the people playing were really cool. Unfortunately I didn’t come away with any money but I’m blaming that more on luck that skill, obviously.

Bring me ma babyback ribs

The weather on Wednesday was really average so I went and did some shopping. It was one of the most successful shopping trips I’ve been on. I found trousers that fit, not only did they fit but they are also stretchy so one can lunge in them. What an amazing pair of trousers, I fell in love. I also bought some boardies because I could. My back was hurting from driving Sinbad around so I decided that I would treat myself to a massage. Hector was so calm and quiet when he introduced himself to me. However, when that door was closed he was mean and aggressive and it hurt. But afterwards I felt a lot less tight. Fun fact about Hector, he was missing a toe on one foot. These are the exciting tidbits that you find out about someone when you are looking at their toes for half an hour. The best part about the day was my lunch, I was recommended a place called Flame for their ribs, duly eaten and thoroughly enjoyed. Probably the best ribs I’ve ever had, it’s like they were made my Carlsberg. Not a bad day!

My view from lunch

The next morning I wanted something to do that was a bit more chilled out. so had another chat with Hayley, very knowledgeable. She recommended a trip up the Skyline gondola and there was a beautiful view of Queenstown. I had a delicious buffet lunch with said view and headed back down the gondola after taking some tourist photos, and by that I mean photos of tourists taking photos! My favourite part was listening to 2 girls discuss their first world problems, they were definitely on their GAP yah. Quote of the day: “it’s not my fault that my daddy chooses to pay for my stuff”, boom! That was the whole conversation, I had to hold myself back from getting involved. I had a wander around town again and the frozen yoghurt shop I had walked past a couple of days before was actually open so I went in and made friends. I accidentally made friends with the owners because I thought this girl was chatting to someone whilst they took a piss. Fortunately she wasn’t, it was just the toilet and the kitchen were opposite each other, it was very funny but you had to be there. Coincidentally she was the owner and from near Oxford I think so we fell to talking. Always nice to make friends with people that sell food. In the evening I hung out at the campsite and made friends with a single mother from French Guyana, the child (aged 2.5) was adorable but just ran wild. I don’t know how she could travel for 3 months with a small child, I would probably have just put it up for adoption.

Thanksgiving Day Football

Friday was Thanksgiving in America due to time difference so I went back to the pub to watch the American football games. There turned out to be a lot of Americans from Seattle so I joined in with the excitement. For those that know my true allegience, I was quietly routing against the Seahawks because they ruined my dreams. After the game I left for Wanaka, where the adventure was just about to start…

Woodie’s Wisdom: Visit Queenstown!

This made me chuckle because
I'm a child