Te Anau to Arrowtown

On the road again this time moving on from Southland and in to the Central Otago region of South Island.

It was not long before we arrived at the shores of Lake Wakatipu. There is no mistaking the lake’s glacial origins. The steep, rugged slopes of the Remarkables drop down to the lake’s edge, leaving downtown Queenstown snuggled on one of the few pieces of relatively flat land in the area.

We also passed the much-photographed Lake Hayes en route to our ovenright stop.

Our destination was Arrowtown, 13 miles from Queenstown and nestled in the foot of rugged hills, Arrowtown is the most picturesque and best preserved gold-mining town in the area.

Following a pleasant 2-hr road journey we arrived in Arrowtown and promptly set out to explore - it didn’t take too long as it’s not a huge place! That is also part of its appeal to us anyway. The main street, partly lined with deciduous trees, has many old colonial shops and buildings at one end, and, at the other, tiny miners’ stone cottages dating back to the 1860s and 1870s.

After lunch we returned to Queenstown, home of the Skyline Gondola. As it was such a lovely sunny and clear day we thought it would be a great opportunity to take the gondola ride up to Bob’s Peak. It rises 450m in just 730m and provided us with breathtaking panoramic views of the Remarkables, Lake Wakatipu and Queenstown from the observation deck at the top. We also saw people par ascending, bunji jumping and taking the luge down to the bottom!
We spent a lovely couple of hours enjoying both the views and the fine, warm summer sunshine.

Returning to Arrowtown we made reservations for dinner at a local restaurant and after freshening up we took a loop-walk of about an hour by the River Arrow. This is where in Gold Rush times people would pan for gold nuggets (some of which we actually saw in the local shops - gold nuggets that is, not people from that time in history!!).



It was a pleasantly warm summer evening and just right for strolling along the riverbanks. Dinner was superb and we were able to sit outside in the restaurant’s gardens enjoying our meal and some local rose wine until the sun finally went down. A romantic and fitting end to Valentine’s Day! Just perfect.