As you know, I went off to Queenstown for 2 nights. It’s not a very long time to go away, but the time we were there was pretty action packed with a full schedule of things to look at, and do. We didn’t just go to Queenstown, we also travelled to the surrounding towns and attractions nearby. The journey starts off on Sunday late afternoon, when I went up to school with all my gear and got on the bus with about 30 other students to go off to Queenstown on a geography field trip.

The bus left school at 5pm, on the dot. Everyone managed to get there before five so no one was left behind. Then it was off to Queenstown. It was a long ride, and it started getting darker, and in about an hour of travelling, it was pitch black. We did however stop in Alexandra for dinner, which was after 7pm. I had KFC, which didn’t taste that nice. It was greasy and the chicken was tasteless. The chips were too salty for my liking. The potato and gravy was edible and so was the bread. Then we went back on the road and off to our destination.

At 9:30, we were at our destination. We were staying at Lakeland Park Camp in Kelvin Heights, which is about 30 minutes out of Queenstown. There we settled in an were in bed and lights out at 11pm. I found it difficult to get to sleep, and ended up having a horrible night. I was really tired in the morning, but a nice hot shower sorted me out. We had to get ready to leave to go into town and needed to be on the bus at quarter past nine.

From there, our first stop was Frankton, which is 6km out of Queenstown. There we first went and had a look at the Queenstown Airport, and took a lot of pictures of various things there. Next we went to the Remarkables Park shopping center. Here we had the opportunity to have a look around the shops and buy food and other things if we wanted. After that, we got back on the bus and made our way to Queenstown.

Here we just drove around the town looking at places in the town, and then we made our way to the gondola. Everyone went up the hill in the gondola and at the top there, drew a sketch of the Queenstown area as well as taking pictures of the area from the top of the hill. After that, we got to go on the Luge. It was awesome! Then we made our way down the hill and back onto the bus at quarter past twelve.

Then we went and drove up to Arrowtown. We had a look around the town, and had food there. There is not much in the town, not many shops and stuff. I had lunch there and got a Mince Pie and a Pepsi, which was damn expensive, and cost me $5.90. Rip off! It was a good pie though and it didn’t come out of my pocket so I was alright with it. Then we went back on the road.

We went to the Bungy jumping bridge and there was watched a quick video while the people going for a jump got set up. Out of all of us, only 3 of our group jumped, one was my geography teacher, and the other two did a double tandem jump. It was really cold out there but it was interesting to see people jump. It looked scary. It’s something I can never see myself doing, ever! Then we went back towards Queenstown and to the wharf so people that wanted to go on the jetboat could. I decided not to go on it.

Then it was back to camp to do whatever until it was dinner time. At 7pm, everyone got onto the bus and we went into Queenstown to have our dinner. Me and my mates walked around Queenstown for 15 minutes looking for a pizza place, but we had no luck so weended up going back and going into the mall and having McDonalds. I had a $10 voucher so I ended up getting more that I would want. I got a Large Quarter Pounder combo, a hamburger, and a chocolate ice cream sundae. After eating all of that, I was pretty full. I do however regret eating the sundae, because it was damn cold and I was frozen for ages.

Then we made it back to the camp where we watch 2 movies that we hired. The first one was Jumper, which I happened to have seen in the weekend on DVD at home. It was interesting watching it a second time, but that’s a story for another post. I decided not to watch the second movie, Chuck and Larry, because I had seen it before and it wasn’t that interesting. I went into my cabin and the group of use talked for a while and eventually went to sleep.

In the morning, it was time to pack. I stuffed all my gear in my bag, which didn’t fit as perfectly as it did when I packed to come on the trip, but I managed to get it all in anyway. Then it was time to clean. I ended up vacuuming 3 of the boys cabins which wasn’t that bad because it warmed me up. Then were were on the bus and started travelling.

We did make a stop at the Millbrook Resort, where one of the guys there gave us a quick tour of the place. We had a look at some of the buildings, the eating facilities, and one of the rooms. It was really fancy, and expensive to own. The guy also told us a little about when Bill Gates was staying there. No one ever saw him, but they had stories about his body guards and what room he stayed and what he did.

Then it was time to head back home to Dunedin. The trip back was longer and more boring than the trip there. We stopped again in Alexandra, this time for Lunch at 1pm. This time I had Subway. The nice old lady behind the register talked me into getting more than I intended. I had a meatball sub with a drink and 2 cookies. It was quite nice, much better than KFC by a long shot. Then it was a 3 hour journey back to Dunedin.

We got back home at 4pm and Dad was waiting to pick me up there. It was a really good trip and I enjoyed it lots. I wish it was a little longer so we could look at more things and do more things as well. This is the last trip for the year, and for my high school life. I’m happy my last school trip was a great one. Oh, and not once did I think about the internet, or miss it. Although I was Plurking some of the time I was there. I took heaps of pictures, 200 (500MB) to be exact which I will slowly upload to Flickr over the next few days. Queenstown is AWESOME!

Despite yesterdays awful weather, both of the year 13 Geography classes went on a fieldtrip down to the beach. The purpose of this trip was to see human interference on coastal processes. This is important because the information we will collect and the things we will see will help us with an internal assessment later on in the term.

So anyway, when I woke up that morning, I could hear the rain hitting the roof of the house. I was a little disappointed because I had hoped for better weather because I would rather stay warm and dry than cold and wet. I was sure they wouldn’t cancel the trip so I went up school prepared, with pens, paper, lunch and a camera. As I got to school, the rain had settled, although it looked like it could start again at anytime. Regardless, down at the beach was going to be wet and icky.

Everyone got on the bus, and we were off on the trip. Our first stop was down to the Dunedin City Council where we would meet with a lady that will talk about Coastal Dunedin. Oddly, she was Australian and had only been here doing the job for 5 weeks, although she did seem to have a fair bit of knowledge. She talked and there was a slideshow on the projector, but I couldn’t see that. I did have a look and touch of some plants that are down there.

After that, we started heading down to the beach area. But before we went there, we stopped outside McDonalds for people to get (and eat) lunch. It was only quarter to 11 so it was a very early lunch. Me and my mates decided to walk down the road a little bit and get Burger King instead. I got a BK Chicken Value Meal. It was really good, much much better than anything McDonalds could offer.

Then it was time to go down to the beach. We went down the St Clair beach and walked along it. We looked at the water and what the beach looked like. Everyone took heaps of pictures so we could look at them and refer to them later on. During this walk, the weather was starting to get worse. It didn’t pour down, but it was starting to drizzle. We then got back into the bus and drove further along the beach. At this point, it was raining. The teacher decided that we would stay in the bus and not go outside and do what was originally planned.

Driving around for 2 hours was interesting but started to get boring. Then we got back to school and I went home. I don’t know if it is a good thing or a bad thing that the weather was bad, but at least we didn’t have to go out in the rain and get cold and wet. If it wasn’t raining, we would have been collecting data of the beach such as measurements, calculations, sketches and pictures of the beach, so I suppose we got of that work. The trip wasn’t that bad because it meant a day of school. I can’t wait for the next Geography fieldtrip later on in the year, we’re going to Queenstown!

Geography Beach Fieldtrip Photographs are at http://flickr.com/photos/yum9me/sets/72157605209611191/