Queenstown is Remarkable!

Nestled at the foot of a spectacular mountain range known only as ‘The Remarkables’, Queenstown is a bustling, not-so-small-anymore lakeside ski town that thrives on year-round ‘extreme’ sports. It bills itself as ‘The Adventure Capital of the World’ and lives up to it.

We arrived at 5pm with little knowledge of the area, no plans, and no reservations. As it turned out, the first place we stopped had one suite left with the best view in the city, the Honeymoon suite… “We’ll take it!” Everyone was sooooo nice. They proceeded to tell us about a special little restaurant called Gantley’s that they said would be perfect for our only evening in town.

Since we had a couple hours to kill before dinner and hadn’t gotten to sail in Auckland, we thought we’d check if afternoon sailing would be a possibility. The only boat available was leaving in 15 minutes so we rushed down to the docks.

NZL 14 placed 3rd in the 1992 America’s Cup race and now takes tourists out on Lake Wakatipu in Queenstown. The captain started his speech by indicating that the winds were unusually strong at 22-25 knots with gusts up to 30 knots, and as he put it, “the absolute maximum for taking passengers out.” He went on to tell us that we can expect to get wet and they are not responsible for damaged or lost cameras.

Check out the exciting sail and more shots from our time in Queenstown here.