Wednesday June 6^th

I was awake fairly early this morning, so I ended up bundling up and sitting outside on the porch. It was a brisk mid-30s but the town was so quiet and beautiful as a low fog had settled over and a light dusting of snow brushed the streets.

I was also able to call Logan for a while, for which he rubbed it in that it was 80 degrees and very warm back home! It was so good to hear his voice and laugh to start my morning, and we are both excited that there’s only 26 more days until we get to see each other again!

After having a great start to my day, Arianna and I headed to AJ Hackett Bungee, the company that we were zip lining through. At noon, we took a complimentary bus about 20 minutes up the road to the historic Kawarau Bridge – where the world’s first commercial bungee operation opened inn 1988. We got the GoPro set up, the crew strapped us in, and Arianna & I were ready for tandem zip lining. The zip line itself was 426 feet long and got up to 40 mph. There was multiple ways we could be strapped in, and the crew convinced us it’d be funny to do the “honeymoon” position – which involved Arianna basically sitting on top of me and us facing each other – we all got a good laugh about it, especially when the crew started singing “can you feel the love tonight” song! We both had a great time, although we agreed we wish it could’ve lasted longer. After that, we both ordered some raspberry french toast for lunch, and watched other people bungee jump. I’ll admit it, in that moment I was quite temped to buy a spur-of-the-moment ticket to bungee jump… but I decided I wasn’t ready for that extent of adrenaline… yet. At 2pm we boarded the bus back to Queenstown and took a little break to just relax at our hostel. The activities and cold have been proving to tire us out!

Kawarau Zipline

Kawarau Zipline

Kawarau Zipline

Kawarau Zipline

Lunch

Around 4:30 pm we walked out of Nomads and a few steps down to Lake Wakatipu where we took some cute and amazing pictures of the stunning, fog-covered Remarkables mountain range.

Lake Wakatipu

Lake Wakatipu

Lake Wakatipu

Lake Wakatipu

Lake Wakatipu

Lake Wakatipu

We then continued walking along a trail that followed Lake Wakatipu where we had to stop for many photo ops and a playground along the way! We continued walking up a hill and were able to see the lake view and mountain backdrop from a new perspective, and it was just as remarkable. The sun sets early here, so at about 5:30 pm it was quite dark. We decided to head back to Nomads to warm up a bit and hang out before dinner. Arianna & I played a few card games in the lounge area of Nomads, and when 7:30 pm rolled around we left for dinner. A local restaurant/bar, Loco, pairs up with Nomads and provides free vegetarian chili for Nomad’s guests with the purchase of a drink. The chili was surprisingly decent (I’m not a huge chili fan but it was only $6 so I can’t complain!). We spent about an hour hanging out there and listening to live music. But after a long day of being outside in the cold and our stomachs being full, our beds were calling our names.

It was another beautiful and amazing day spent in Queenstown, New Zealand!