Hit the Road, Mate!

Early in the morning, we checked out the backpackers in Queenstown. It's a nice change now that we don't have to hitch hike. It's officially the begining of our road trip! We went back to Arrowtown, because yd wanted to retake some of the scenery shots as it was kinda overcast yesterday.

We passed by some vineyards and went on a wine tasting tour at Gibston Valley Vineyard.

early autumn morning at Gibston vineyard

One of the lady staff at Gibston saw us taking picture of this bunch of grape and plucked a small bunch from the same plant and offered to us. We were told it's the Chardonnay grape. It has a unique aroma and tasted semi sweet and sour.

While we were happily sampling the grapes, to my horror I found bird dropping on one of the grapes! That was so close! And guess what? I plucked and threw away the shit-stained grape and offered yd and Koo the rest..muahahaha!!!

Unfermented wine in stainless steel tanks. It smelled so good we wished we could just help oursleves to the tap.

Going into the wine cellar

The wine cave was built 76m underground into the Central Otago hillside. Central Ontago is the most southerly wine producing reagion in the world.

wine sample - I bought a bottle of the late-harvest Reisling dessert wine for our impromptu picnic on the road

more long clouds

a different kinda scenery at Lindis Pass

reflection

reflection

more reflection!

while yd was busy taking shots of his obsession - reflection, Koo noticed these giant mushrooms beside. Then, when yd was half-squatting to get the perfect angle for his shot, Koo jumped onto his back, and I followed by jumping onto Koo's. Next, we all collapsed to the ground, and Koo fell onto and killed the giant mushrooms!

the crime scene

ruthless murderer with her victim - Koo insisted bagging the body back!

As we continued our journey, we passed by a salmon falm at Twizel and decided to get some fresh salmon.

feeding salmons, before eating 'em :p I must mentioned how cheap and delicious the salmon was. NZ$14+ for a big fat piece of salmon fillet and we had it as sashimi. Oishii ne!!!*drooling*

another picturous scene - i guess i'm already out of word choice for better description

a lonely big tree by lake tekapo (see the famous Church of the Good Shepard in distance?)

The Church of Good Shepard by Lake Tekapo

Lake Tekapo

Later we decided to put up a night at a lovely motel/backpackers at Lake Tekapo. And we had fresh Salmon sashimi for dinner..ohh!! that's the way road trip should be!!

That night, we had a good laugh trying to challenge each other pronouncing the longest place name in NZ on Lonely Planet. We simply couldn't finish the entire word not just because of it's length and difficulty to pronounce, but it's pronounciation. A little bit of maori 101 here, 'wh' is pronoucned as 'f' in maori, eg Atawhai is pronounced as 'uh-ta-fai'. Now try pronounce the bloody longest place name below:

Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanatahu

Now you should know why we laughed our lung out trying to say 'taumatawhaka'!!