Day 7: Wanaka
Following the Glacier Expedition boat tour on the 11th, we drove into the town of Wanaka and got coffee (or the best equivalent) at Ritual Espresso. We brought in the iPad and the camera to edit some photos and do a blog post. However, Becca noticed a sign saying, “No WiFi – You’ll Have To Talk To Each Other.” It made us smile through some slight frustration, but we did understand what they were getting at. We’ve always been pretty intentional to just enjoy one another when we’re out to each or get coffee, but we were surprised at how often we saw other tables of people all on their phones in NZ – at cafes and dinner spots. Maybe they just wanted to update their blogs, too? Based on the downward thumb swipes typical of scrolling through any social media platform…probably not. 🙂 We enjoyed our awkwardly-ordered Americanos at Ritual while discussing potential hikes and then walked a couple blocks over to admire Lake Wanaka before heading to our AirBnB.
We dropped off our stuff, grabbed water, and headed out to do a hike. At first, we thought about doing Roy’s Peak, but Becca read in the guidebook that it gets busy in the summer so we decided to give the Minaret Burn Track a try. The tracks in New Zealand are what we call trails in the US. The trailhead heads list three guides of tracks: One shows a person and a child, meaning a well-formed track for easy walking; a second shows a person walking, meaning a walking track which is a defined, well-formed track suitable for most ages and abilities; and the third is a tramping track showing a person with a backpack, meaning limited track formation, often with steep grades. Minaret was listed as a person walking. We expected a chill flat-ish path along the lake leading to a quiet swimming beach. It turned out to be quite hilly (850 ft elevation gain) and had a couple exposed places to the sun. We both got quite warm since we had worn long sleeves and pants to avoid too much sun exposure. (Scott later bought what he is calling an Australian Outback hat with fabric hanging off the back, covering the neck and ears.) In total this was another 4 mile hike, and we never made it to the beach. Our path didn’t bring us sight of any other hikers, but we did run into a few friendly mountain bikers. We were thankful that we hadn’t done Roy’s Peak since that would have been all up hill and on an exposed side of the hill.
After cooling off and showering we drove 5 minutes into town. Before dinner we spent a few minutes at the lake watching sailboats racing.
For dinner, we walked a few blocks down the main road and attempted to eat at Kika’s, a local New Zealand tapas place, but the waitlist was an hour long. Instead, we ate a cafe/bar near the lake, sharing a pizza and pork buns.
Side Notes:
⁃ With how many places have pizzas on their menus and highly recommended in reviews, you’d think pizza was invented in NZ.
⁃ Though there are many cider options available, we haven’t seen Zeffer’s Apple Crumble Cider since Lake Tekapo.
Additional photos available on Smugmug.