We so enjoyed Queenstown and staying at the Matakauri Lodge from our first visit to New Zealand, we scheduled an extended return at the end of our vacation. We highly recommend the Matakauri Lodge. Their service is impeccable, and the views from the room are magnificent.
The lodge sits on Lake Wakatipu, which is unusually long, deep (averages 900 feet with a currently known depth of 1,200 feet), and narrow. These features, combined with variations in wind pressure along the 84 kilometer lake, actually give the lake a very rare feature found few places on earth: a natural rise and fall–a tide of between 3 and 8 inches every 6 minutes. The native peoples named the lake Wakatipu which, while impossible to accurately translate, refers to the sleeping giant’s heartbeat, this tidal affect. The water temperature is all but stable at an icy 53º.
Our vacation came to an end in the snow. All of these partial panos were shot from inside the room looking out; so, you will see reflections from the windows.
The final four partial panos were all shot from Walter Peak, a working sheep farm across the lake from Queenstown. We took the TSS Earnslaw from Queenstown to Walter Peak.
Other links in this series:
- NZ Partial Panos (Part 1: Waiheke Island)
- NZ Partial Panos (Part 2: Abel Tasman Reserve & The Waters)
- NZ Partial Panos (Part 3: Queenstown & The Matakauri Lodge) [this post]