New Zealand Ski Trip 2014 - Part 1

Hi all, it's been a while since I've updated but I really will try harder from now on. This series of posts is going to be all about my recent ski trip to Queenstown, New Zealand, with my family and Nicole :) I tried to take more photos but I did forget at times.. hope you enjoy!

I've been to New Zealand before, in 2012 during the summer holidays. We went on a road trip of the south island in a campervan, stopping at towns such as: Omaru, Te Anau, Dunedin, and Queenstown. This time, we flew in directly to Queenstown and stayed at the Copthorne Lakeside Hotel in Queenstown. We arrived on the 7th of July, skiing five days and resting one, before flying back home on the 13th.

Day One
We caught an early morning flight, leaving home at 6:15 as a middle ground between the 6am that mum wanted, and the 6:30 that dad wanted. I'm thankful we left then because there was an accident on the freeway which caused dad to take some back roads and we arrived later to the airport than we had planned. We then ran into problems with checking in the baggage which left us walking quickly to the gates as soon as we passed immigration to make it to the plane on time. We were, however, not the last group to board. :)




New Zealand is two hours ahead, so we arrived around 2:30 in the afternoon. (I watched Noah and part of Divergent on the plane: would recommend Noah for its more artsy filming and Emma Watson, a good spin on a bible story) We rented a car from Budget - make sure that your chains are the right size for your wheels! Ours weren't and we had a lot of trouble getting them onto the tyres and then had to travel very slowly down the mountain. After checking in at the hotel, we went into town to hire our ski gear and pick up our lift passes. Mum and Dad arranged everything through Flight Centre, if you book through them as well, make sure that all the paperwork is correct and you have all the vouchers with you when you go to use them. Our paperwork had not been typed up correctly, though luckily since Australia is two hours behind, Flight Centre were still open and we able to fix the problem for us. We didn't bring our ski gear with us because it's rather a hassle to pack 6 pairs of skis, poles and boots (6? I think everyone has their own boots and skis.. I think) and we don't own any ski bags.. We rented them through Browns Ski Shop and Snowbiz. It seems that most returns come in before 7, so just past 7 is a good time to drop in to pick up new gear. When we went, most of the racks were empty and the employees said that it'd never been this busy before. I conclude that because it was both the New Zealand and Australia school holidays, along with the fact that the forecast for mountains such as Mount Buller and Mount Hotham had been rather dismal in snowfall, everyone had flocked to New Zealand to ski. Coincidentally, most Victorian mountains are currently sitting around one metre of snow while the Queenstown mountains were below 80cm..

While sorting out the Flight Centre mix-up, we grabbed a quick dinner from Fergbaker. Pictured below is Fergbaker: next door is Fergburger, a popular burger restaurant that at any point of the day, on any day, has a sizeable queue and at least a half hour wait. At night the queue is about 1-2 hours. Fergbaker on the other hand, had a small queue as the pies, loafs and all other sorts of bready goodness, are made in the early mornings.

Picture by Alex Tilbury     Sourced from The Herald Sun

Got a sweet pair of boots at Browns, which did seem to have nicer equipment than other stores, however only an average rental pair of skis. Seems kind of redundant, I'd rather have nicer skis than nice boots. I think you can upgrade to 'executive skis' for an extra cost.

Went to bed soon after arriving back at the hotel, sharing a room with Nicole and my little sister, Linh.
Here's a photo of Nicole and I in our MUSki shirts - sorry, I didn't take photos on the first day really.

Lingly and I - muski2014

Day Two
First day skiing! Walked out of the hotel to an amazing view, you've definitely got to make sure that you get a lake view (though ours was on the ground floor and there's a hill coming out, so you couldn't exactly stare out the window and see the lake - however we did get the mountains!) and that you're away from any garage doors so you're not being bothered by the constant sounds.

My older brother, Nam near the top of the mountain

Nam skiing in front of my photo ^^

Getting to Coronet Peak from Queenstown is a 20 minute drive and you can choose to take the bus or your own vehicle. It's quite similar to Buller where there are multiple car parks and then a shuttle bus that takes you to the base. The Queenstown mountains do not have any on-mountain lodging and thus, there was only one restaurant and two small shops on either side of the mountain. Thankfully, the restaurant had a large outdoor seating area, and with the sunny weather - it was pleasant to sit outside.

My younger sister, Linh, at the outside seating area

My younger brother, Vu - thankfully it was a sunny day :)

The snow was pretty good, a little icy on some runs. We were up at Coronet Peak and had a private lesson between Nicole, my brother Nam and me. Our instructor was Simon and he's a Queenstown local so if you have a chance to request an instructor, I would definitely recommend him. He's very technical and taught concepts that I'd never even thought about all the years I've been skiing. I definitely feel that my skiing has changed after only three half-day lessons with him. On the first day, we worked on balance - which, after two years of not skiing and always leaning back while skiing, I really needed. We also covered most of the mountain so that we'd know where to ski after the lesson (Nicole's been skiing in NZ before but her sense of direction.. I'd be more comfortable knowing the layout of the mountain myself - but it's not easy to get lost). There's only three chairlifts and one t-bar and it's quite easy to get from one side of the mountain to the other. The only part we had to be careful about, was making sure that the run ended up at the lift we wanted. A full run is quite long on Coronet Peak and is generally made up of two or three actual runs. The runs intersect with each other so you need to observe every entry point and keep a good view of those around you.

The view from our car park

I cannot remember if I took these from inside the car or not..

The chairlifts closes at 4pm, which I found quite early as the Victorian mountains close around 5-5:30. Coming down from the mountain, we made a late booking to The Captain but the wait time was too long and ended up walking into Brazz and waiting about 20 minutes for a table. In this time, Nicole and I went off to the super market to buy some snacks :3. After ordering, it took nearly a full hour for the food to arrive and by this time the restaurant had begun to empty. The food was.. big. I ate a lot on this trip. and oops I don't have any photos of the food.

Nicole and I before dinner

Sweg. Lingly, Vu and I

Click on to read Part 2 and Part 3 of this series.

faithfully,
Mai