Carving it up in Queenstown

Some of you may recall that last year we spent a lovely few days ski-ing in Queenstown. We had hoped that this wouldn't be a one off for 2013 and even planned a weekend at 'the Mountain' (Mount Ruapehu on the North Island) with Hannah and Jody for my birthday weekend last year hoping for some powder, but to no avail due to weather conditions. Time has flown by and ski season is upon us again. Given Hannah and Jody were still ski-ing virgins we weren't going to leave anything to chance this year. Flights and bach booked in Queenstown for a long weekend, the weekend before we popped up to Snow Planet (an indoor snow dome near Auckland) so Matt and I could refresh our skills and Hannah and Jody could learn the ropes. No problem there as both picked up the basics pretty quick, although Jody may have been a little over ambitious going up to the top quite so soon...

Needless to say we were all super excited when Friday morning 5.15am came around and Hannah and Jody picked us up to head to the airport.

EXCITED!

On arrival in Queenstown we were super efficient in picking up the hire car, collecting our pre booked ski equipment and doing a mega supermarket shop. Just time to pop to our bach before heading to the slopes.

The view from our bach

The place was amazing! A bit out of town, stunning views, a wood burning stove and comfy beds with electric blankets. Hannah and I wondered if we could just hang out there with books for the weekend!

Happy Matt itching to get to the slopes

The boys of course had other ideas so warm clothing thrown on and we were off to Coronet Peak for an afternoon on-piste. I stuck with Hannah and Jody on the beginner slopes whilst Matt headed off to the top.

The Bailey-Wells duo learning the ropes

From the top

Very happy Matt

Someone else enjoying the views

A successful afternoon over (with a couple of falls thrown in for good measure) and we popped into town for a swift one at Atlas before heading back for the first curry of the weekend, a couple more beers and an early night.

Next morning and we were up and off for the slightly hair raising drive up to the Remarkables ski field.

Getting ready for a fun packed day on the slopes

The weather couldn't have been more beautiful and later on that day Matt and I lured Jody up onto the chair lift for a bit of a longer run. Might have been a bit premature again but we did all get to the bottom in one piece!

Assorted ski bunnies

Post chair lift fun, pre ski-ing to the bottom. Smiles all round!

Feeling a bit more confident getting off the lifts this year meant I could actually enjoy the experience and the view - I had pretty good company too!

Loving life

 A very full day complete, we headed straight back to the bach for drinks and curry number 2.

Enjoying the early evening sun at the back of our bach

Epic poppadoms pre an even more
epic curry courtesy of Hannah and Jody

Getting into the swing of things we were straight onto the slopes for day 3 with Hannah and Jody taking a lesson in the morning to hone their skills, me going up and down on the chair lift countless times coming down quicker (and more controlled!) as the day progressed. And Matt... Well Matt really did get carried away covering nearly all of the field's runs including the big scary black run which looked like a sheer drop to the viewer (and apparently was even more terrifying from the top!)

View from the top - luckily there
was an easier way down than Matt's black run

We all thoroughly enjoyed ourselves on the last day and were pretty sad to say goodbye to our ski equipment that evening. Especially Jody - who had become Judy to us for the duration of the trip due to a minor mis-spelling of his name

We saved the proper apres ski for the last night with plenty of beers and a visit to the world famous Fergburger to satiate our huge appetities!

A bit more silliness (there was a lot worse than this photo!) in town and then back to the bach for a bit more before a very late last night.

Matt and his new mate

What a few days. We've definitely caught the ski-ing bug!

Fiji part 2

Having got to nearly 30 without ever doing a resort holiday (despite going on a fair few holidays) we figured that the second half of our Fijian adventure was the ideal opportunity to kick back and relax with all of our food and drinks sorted for us! Our resort was located on the Coral Coast - a beautiful area of the main Fijian island Viti Levu. Getting off the bus with our backpacks and walking up the drive of the resort we were immediately impressed.

Silly photo to get things started!

Oriental flavour in the South Pacific

The rest of the five days didn't disappoint me with plenty of food, drink, tennis, more food, golf, gin and tonics (several), snorkelling, yet more food, reading/sunbathing etc to keep me busy. The bad news was that Matt was rather disappointed, as he caught a bit of nasty tummy bug which seriously impeded his ability to eat and drink anywhere near as much he had anticipated. I tried to make up for it... But even my amazing breakfast capabilities didn't quite cover it! Here's a few pics of the five days:

Yummy dinner with bubbles on our first night

A spot of lounging in the sun

Another dinner, this time with water only for Matt...

Matt honing his golfing skills

Breakfast seconds/thirds for me

Snorkelling in the lagoon - beautiful fishies!

The lagoon at our resort

Chill time

One of our 6 games of tennis (yes, we played every
 day - even  when Matt was feeling super peaky.
I think beating me made him feel better every time!

Cruise on our last night

Bubbles with a side of pineapple
juice on our last night - why not?!

The five days flew by and we were soon downgraded back to our usual backpacker status with another bumpy bus ride back to Nadi and a spot of lunch at a little Indian cafe in town followed by checking out the Hindu temple before our flight home.

Still a bit peaky, bur never top ill for onion bhajis and daal!

Architecture with personality!

Fiji - tick! A great introduction to the South Pacific and the beginning of a few late winter/spring adventures as the clock counts down our twenties!

Fiji!

There are times living in New Zealand when we forget how far from home we really are. Routine and the familiarity of our new home sometimes distracts us from the fact that we live on a volcanic island on the edge of the Pacific Ocean, that our nearest neighbour is Australia and that we don't shop at Tesco's anymore (mind you, sometimes we call Countdown Tesco's, so I suppose it doesn't really matter). 

But then now and again we remember that we are on the other side of the planet. Case in point - Friday early afternoon I leave work and head to the hospital in South Auckland where Matt works. We jump in the van parked up outside and head to the airport and just three hours later we're in .... Fiji! Tropical paradise and jewel of the South Pacific and so very close to our temporary home. We really are a world away from our real home!

After work drinks!

 With both our 30th birthdays fast approaching we thought what better way to celebrate (early) than ten days on a tropical island. I don't expect this to be the last celebration for said birthdays, so watch this space for more celebratory blog posts.

Having slept off the work week (and a couple of local beers) we awoke to a glorious sunrise and not a bad beach at the backpackers we were staying at close to the airport. Not quite the golden sand from the postcards, but a good warm up for what the rest of our first day had to offer. I will say now it was probably the best first day (and maybe even ANY day) of a holiday EVER.

Not a bad beach really - don't believe
everything you read in the Lonely Planet

 So how did we spend this first glorious day then?

CRUISING!

 A bit of this:

 Some of this:

 All aboard this:

An hour and half aboard on a high speed katamaran followed by the rest of the day on the sail boat 'Seaspray' was our introduction to Fiji's Mamanuca islands, and what an introduction. Our welcome aboard the boat was accompanied by bubbles and cake, unlimited beer thereafter...

Getting a taste for Fiji Bitter and
life aboard the good ship Seaspray

 And a very close viewing of a pod of dolphins!

WOW!

Glorious!

Beautiful!

 After a good play following the boat the dolphins disappeared off to find something else to do whilst we approached a real proper deserted island. The locals call it 'Tom Hanks' island in homage to his time spent here filming Castaway - and it really is the same as the island in the movie! After much shouting of 'Wilson' we jumped off with flippers, snorkel and mask in tow to do a bit of snorkelling on the way to shore. The clear, warm sea didn't disappoint and we were treated to a colourful display of some more of the South Pacific's inhabitants!

Tom Hanks island

 A bit of a walk around the island (didn't take long to do the full loop) and we'd worked up an appetite. Back on board then for a buffet lunch, more beer and cake.

Getting used to Fijian hospitality

Next stop, another of the small islands - this one the home of a small number of traditional Fijian families. The Chief of the village welcomed us with a kava ceremony which involved downing a small dish of a non alcoholic drink made from kava (a type of root) which tastes a bit funny, numbs your mouth but somehow does make you feel very welcome!

 A walk through the village and then back on the boat, we had a bit more time for another swim:

Wish this was my dive!

Enjoying life we rounded off the day with a a sunset trip back to the 'mainland' on the katamaran.

Drunk on beer, kava, dolphins and sun

The sun sets on a beautiful part of the world

Feeling like we could stay in Fiji forever if the first day was anything to go by we awoke excited to head up to the foothills of the mountains near to Nadi (the airport town) for the next part of our trip. Taxi hailed we were soon on our way and pleased to hear that by chance our driver hailed from the same village as the place we had booked to stay in - Sabeto. He was pleased with this fact too, so much so that he took the opportunity to fit his supermarket shopping into the journey...

Spot the keys left in the ignition so we could listen to the radio

 Feeling rather irritated I soon remembered that we were on Fiji time, not Auckland time and just to chill out - our first taste of 'no worry, no hurry' - Fiji's unofficial motto.

On arrival at Stoney Creek Resort (our home for the next two nights) we were pleasd to see that it wasn't really a resort (we were saving that for the last part of the trip), it had the most amazing views of the mountains all around... and we were the only ones staying there!

Room no.1 (also known as the room
with the best view) for us then!

Peace and tranquility were the order of the next couple of days - you couldn't help but relax when greeted with this from our own private terrace:

Relaxed feet

Of course, doing absolutely nothing was never an option for us. Fitting a rather hot 10k in on the first day we decided a walk was more appropriate on the second, which took us to a hot springs and mud pool where we got really really dirty (particularly Matt) and then super super clean!

Attempting to look scary whilst
covered in restorative mud

 Having slapped on the mud we let it properly dry in the sun before we jumped in an oozy, gooey mud pool to remove the crusty layer.

This bikini may never look the same again!

Luckily, the final step in the process was a much cleaner hot pool which we soaked in until we felt clean from the inside out.

A walk back through sugar farms and over a stream we caught up on some reading, enjoyed another beautiful sunset and a delicious meal.

The sun setting on the Mountains of the Sleeping Giant

Before bed we had a bit of a kids fest with multiple ping pong games and a good old fashioned Monopoly-a-thon. Believe it or not I actually lost this game despite my stash of cash!

Probably shouldn't have showboated so much with all the £100 bills!

Our second and last morning left us time for a last cup of tea on our terrace with our adopted cat Jo (three legged, but our ideal cat nonetheless).

Not a bad spot for a cuppa

Leaving comfort behind we jumped on a local bus for a bone jangling bus journey back to Nadi, followed by another (slightly less bone jangling) journey to our next destination, the Coral Coast where more comfort awaited us - part 2 coming soon!

Open air travel !