Viva el blue sky!

Wow.. what a trip! This was my second time going to New Zealand and the breath-taking scenery as well as the vast and untouched landscapes didn’t fail to impress once again! The trip was perfect, great people, great snow conditions, great tunes, great driving around, great food.. haaaaa, (speechless).. Nothing went wrong! Well..

In the beginning, there was a heavy sleeper

Some of us flew from Sydney, others from Melbourne or Brisbane, with the aim of meeting up at the Christchurch Airport (CHC) or the hotel in Queenstown. Despite all the excitement, Joe didn’t make it to the airport at 7am for the Sydney-Christchurch, allowing Fiona and I to share some extra leg room. Some alarm clock problems, apparently!

Shortly after our arrival in Christchurch, we picked up two 4WD and headed down to Queenstown, our main destination. After a 6+ hours drive and a quick 45 minutes stop in Twizel we finally got to our home for the week, the quite chic St Moritz, about 5 minutes away on foot from the centre of Queenstown.

A common passion

We all knew each others more or less as friends of friends and didn’t know what to expect, except maybe for colder weather and hopefully some amount of snow. We were all very surprised to find out our common passion for the snow created a strong bond and quickly the formal boundaries were replaced by genuine camaraderie.

Snow and weather conditions

Winter in New Zealand is not really harsh, with average temperatures during the day staying above 0°C. This forces the conditions into a nice warm “canadian spring” style skiing on usually slushy snow conditions (at least by the end of the day). Despite the light rain on the first day, we were lucky enough to receive over 30cm of fresh snow on our second day, which contributed to making the conditions more than acceptable for the whole trip. I must admit, I had never really experienced such a heavy and wet powder (about knee deep) which proved physically very hard and challenging! But on the next day, the sun and cold overnight temperatures contributed in drying the snow and making the off-piste conditions nothing less than exquisite!

The resorts

Queenstown has the advantage of being at the heart of the Southern Alps in New Zealand’s south island. About 6 ski resorts are accessible within approximately 1.5h drive, the closest being 15minutes away. We went to Coronet Peak, The Remarkables and Cardrona. Due to high avalanche risk, about 60% of Trebble Cone was closed down, hence why we considered wise (or useless!) to make it there.

Coronet Peak is not the biggest or the highest, but a very good all-round resort with great beginners and intermediate tracks (only ~35% of the runs are black). With a top elevation of 1649m and the base at 1168m (462m vertical), the resort is almost larger than it’s high but being at less than 20min drive from Queenstown, it is definitely the most convenient resort to get to.

The Remarkables, you will have guessed, is nothing less than remarkable. Our first day there has required chains (on a 4WD!!) which, despite my Quebec background, I had never dealt with (winter tyres, people!!?). The resort is very spread out on the nearby mountains and while the base to the peak is only 321m vertical rise, the Homeward runs take you further down and the (homeward) shuttle will take you back. If you’re comfortable on your skis or board, the homeward is definitely worth trying as well as a little hiking – breathtaking in all senses of the word.

Cardrona is most impressive for it’s snow park facilities. It’s a decent resort about 1hr drive from Queenstown and served us well while Trebble Cone (affectionately called TC) was closing off even some of the main runs due to high avalanche risks. The vertical rise is 390m with the main parking, restaurants and rentals being about 150m on the way up. The resort was also quite well organised for lessons catering for all ages and skills level as well as people with disabilities.

What isn’t worth trying is probably the noodle bar, Thai/Asian influence cantine which unfortunately lacks in flavours and freshness, specially if you are used to Sydney’s more than decent Thai food!

Taking injuries home to Sydney

We all made it back home looking back and wishing for our flight to be delayed, or even better, cancelled. We brought with us a few minor injuries, thanks to the last day featuring a very icy surface – fractured arm (that’s Fiona) and two ribs (that’s me). To heal my ribs faster, or at least, numb the pain down a bit, I bought myself bottles of gorgeous Pinot Noir from the duty free shop! :)

Needless to say that heading to work after such a beautiful holiday has proven challenging, to say the least! The mind is still in NZ or contemplating Japan or Canada, and it seems that all spam received since then is about snow!!

My Playlist

I have pretty diverse tastes in music and can’t hide the strong influence electronic music plays in my life. But after having seen Warren Miller’s Children of Winter a few weeks before our departure, I figured a slightly more punk, rock and alternative playlist on my mp3 player could be interesting! Never got around posting the playlist however. :-|