In the morning, I dropped Ryan off at the mountain bike shop and I went to a laundry mat so that we would have clean clothes. I also bought groceries and cleaned out the car. Ryan spent the morning downhill biking at the Queenstown Bike Park "shredding that gnar". Around 2pm, I picked him up, bandaged his wounds, and we hit the road. We made it to Wanaka an hour later and searched for the famous Wanaka Tree. We finally found it on the other side of the lake. It was bigger and greener than I imagined. It was situated IN the beautiful lake with gorgeous mountains in the background. We took pictures and walked back to the car through the park where fragrant roses bloomed.
It was too late to go to the Rippon winery that overlooks the lake so we just drove down the rode towards it and still got a couple good pictures. We got lost for a minute but finally found the right way to go north. We drove along Lake Wanaka as well as another lake. The views were absolutely breathtaking. After a bit, we found the turn off for the Blue Pools. We walked 10 minutes down the trail and crossed over the main river, which was completely clear, on a swing bridge. Through the woods a little ways, we came to another bridge that was directly over the bright blue creek that flowed into the main one. It came from a pretty, rocky canyon and the color of the water was incredible.
The sign said that when the river floods, the blue water turns muddy grey and it takes another flood to clear it out and make it blue again. During the fall and winter months, brown trout can be viewed in the see-through water, as if they're suspended in midair. There were a couple other male tourists who were jumping from the bridge into the pools. That sparked Ryan into wanting to do it as well so I went down below the bridge to film him. He jumped off twice and learned that the temperature was almost just as cold as the Kenai. We didn't spend too much time there and got back on the road.
We made it up to the small town of Haast and put up camp. We cooked dinner and Ryan accidentally dropped a whole avocado into my mixed drink.. He made a grave mistake... 😂
