We drove 8 hours from Queenstown to the very small, adventure tourist-oriented town of Franz Josef in Westland Tai Poutini National Park mainly for the chance to heli-hike on Franz Josef Glacier. When we arrived to check in with Franz Josef Glacier Guides we learned that no helicopters had gone up for the past three …
We started Day 6 of our New Zealand family vacation with a short walk to the car rental outlet in Queenstown. In exchange for a copy of Mr. GeoK's international driving permit and an imprint of his credit card, they handed over the keys to a Toyota Highlander, which easily swallowed our 4 carry-on sized …
Last fall when we asked our boys what they'd like to see and do in New Zealand, they agreed on two things: 1) see some of the sites where Peter Jackson filmed scenes for the Lord of the Rings movie trilogy; and 2) lots of photography. So they were ready and waiting in front of …
Continue reading Lord of the Rings Photo Safari – Queenstown, NZ
Mr. GeoK crash landed his mountain bike last July. His resulting injuries meant we didn't get out hiking again until September. So when we started thinking about where to go for our first big family vacation since 2011, one of the key decision points was that it had to be somewhere we could go hiking …
Less than twenty-four hours after landing in Queenstown, we headed back to the airport for our 10 o'clock helicopter flight to Milford Sound - the most well-known of all the fiords in Fiordland National Park, part of the Te Wahipounamu World Heritage Area. For three of the four of us, this was the first helicopter …