Queenstown to Mt cook

View on the way down to QT
just north of Tekapo

So have returned from my first stint in the the hills. Have broken the trip report in to two parts. First is the breif visit i made down to queenstown with loz and her mate kelly from wa. We left on the 14th and headed on down to qt, the weather was absolutely mint, with bluebird skies due to the large anti-cyclonic high sitting over NZ and the tasman sea. We headed into the dux delux for a pint of ginger tom and formulated a plan of attach for the 15th. Unfortunately anti cyclones are good for sun, and bad for snow. Remarakables was less than remarable from all acounts with lots of stone in the snow surface. We choose to spend up big a cardrona as it had the best of a bad bunch. The days skiing was good with the run of the day being the fresh groomers under captains chair early in the morning. The rest of the day was spent skiing chopped up man made, or killer breakable crust! I think the highlight of the day was when we were walking into town that night seeing a young mad, obviously off his face on some substance running around in a bright pink morph suit, struggling to stay up right. Just as ran/stumbled by us a nice new 4WD went by and beeped, and yelled something at him. We continued on to piuc kelly up from Nomads backpackers. While waiting in the reception low and behold morph suit man came storming through and was quickly ushered back to his dorm. A minute or so later morph suit mans dad, who was driving the 4WD and just happened to be heading through town with the family stormed in. Kelly rocked up to reception, it turned out morph suit man had made a good job of re-painting the walls and ceiling with projectile vomit. All class. We left the idiots to their own devices.

Loz and Kelly skiing at cardrona.

The following day on the 16th we arose early for a mission to the un-remarkables. We we amped up and early, being the 3rd car in the parking lot. We spent 10 mins looking and decided out $70NZD would be better spent else where (luckily they got saome more snow since). We headed on down and packed some food and headed to wanaka. Spent the day crusing and checked out puzzle world which was quite cool. We headed on back to qt. This being kelly's pseudo birthday we headed out to winnies for dinner. The lamb and mexican pizza was tops!

View from Unwin Hut, Mt cook is hidden behind the centre mountain.

The next day dawned fine and sunny, and it was time to leave qt and head to Mt cook. I can say i was happy to see the back of qt, good skiing (with snow) average town. We trucked along and got a bite to eat in Twizel before crusing down to Mt cook village where i rapidly sorted bits and pieces and made ready for the hills. Loz dropped me off at Unwin hut NZAC Member $15, Non $25 per night) and i fluffed around read some mags and sorted my gear. Two fellas one my mountaineering course were also their Joel, and Cam. Me and joel made the demon pasta meal for dinner while cam headed to town for a beer. Chile bean pig dog pasta, what a delight! Anyways suffice to say unwin hut is tip top, goot beds, shower, awesome kitchen, laundry and internet for $15 a night. Tip Top! Right so i will finish up their as i have to disapear into chch and pick some rope, ice screws, and crampons up and will fill you in about 7 days at Kelman hut soon! Hope everyone is well and good!