Makarora to Wanaka and beyond

After Franz, we headed to Makarora and to better weather thankfully. While in Franz Joseph, it was pouring rain, and I mean pouring (hence, why my camera is dead). My friend Anika couldn't even sleep through the night because of the rain (and because she got scared that Franz Joseph was coming to get us-it is a moving glacier after all).

We stopped off at lake Matheson which is the famous mirror lake, but because of the weather, it didn't look like anything, so we all just bought a postcard of it and left it at that.

We drove through a place called the Haast pass which was incredibly beautiful. It looks a lot like the Rockies. Mountains and waterfalls everywhere. Because of all the rain, there were waterfalls flowing down the mountains over rocks everywhere, and the rivers were very full.

We stopped off at another place called the blue pools, but again, because of the crap weather they weren't so blue.

Makarora itself is tiny. I don't think you could even call it a town. Maybe the population is 40. Maybe.
It was beautiful though, right in the middle of the mountains.

The place we stayed had a bar with karaoke. Clearly this made me irrationally excited. I started off the night with a little Bryan Adams, eased into Bohemian Rhapsody, busted out Gangsta's Paradise by Coolio, and closed with Summer of 69, a real crowd pleaser. I won the karaoke prize (no big deal) which is a pub crawl in Queenstown. I don't know if I'll use it, but I was quite pleased that I won.

Looking up at the stars in Makarora was something. Because we were in the middle of nowhere, the stars were exceptional. You could see the outline of the milky way. Also, no moon. You don't see the moon here when its dark out because it is so far south (you see it in the evening when the sun sets, but then it dissapears). That, I think, is wild.

The next morning it was off to Wanaka, which is a smallish town close to Queenstown. Tony Pringle and my brother Alex told me I HAD to come here, mostly on account of the amazing movie theatre, and I'm glad I did. It's awesome. Anika and I did a walk around lake Wanaka and pretty much everywhere you looked could have been a postcard.

Then, last night, we went to Cinema Paradiso, which Tony called the best theatre he's ever been to. It definitely lived up to the high expectation. Instead of movie seats, there are old couches and barka loungers. Before the movie starts, you can order your dinner, and then at the intermission when you come out to the lobby, your food is waiting for you. They also bake cookies that are straight out of the oven at intermission. The place is the best!

Tomorrow I head to Queenstown, the "adventure capital of the world" and will stay for a couple of days. After that I want to go to Fjordland, but I don't know what exactly I'm going to do there, so stay tuned.

One last thing: there is a resident hostel cat here named Smokey. He's bitchy. He makes me miss Spike.

Also, if you want to see more pictures, go to:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2463385&id=13604583&l=4701a60eda