We freakin love New Zealand. It’s the same latitude as Ottawa, other than being “S” rather than “N”. What a difference one letter makes.

This morning in Queenstown it was cool with clouds hugging the mountains. And by “cool” I mean that a long sleeved shirt was appropriate.

We got away early (for us, anyway … 10:00 AM, because that is the usual checkout time here) and headed for Te Anau. The scenery on the drive was stunning … or at least Jan told me it was stunning. My eyes were glued to the road … the winding, and often narrow, road. I caught glimpses of the mountains from the corner of my eye, but I figured that focusing on the road was the best plan. I’m exaggerating … a bit … the roads were actually pretty good, but paying close attention was still a good idea.

It was cool, with broken cloud, for the drive, but by the time we arrived in Te Anau the sky began to clear, and we were treated to this view from the patio of our hotel room.

After we checked in, we walked along the shore of Lake Te Anau into the center of town, enjoying views like this.

There is a small park in the center of town called Te Anau Gardens, with open space and a variety of trees and flowers, so of course, I had to take more pictures.

By now the sky was completely clear. I love the way the deep blue of the sky contrasts with the plants.

And of course, everywhere you look you can also see mountains.

Some of the plants aren’t native to New Zealand … in fact they are often considered weeds. But they can still be beautiful, like this Mountain Ash, or Rowan.

There are increasing efforts to conserve native species, which is a good thing. I’m not sure if the next two plants are native, but they are definitely different than anything I’ve seen before.

The park had one other really cool thing, intended to encourage young readers. A story based on Māori legends was illustrated with a series of posters distributed around the park like a treasure hunt. It’s hard to describe -I know I’m not doing it justice – but it really was neat to follow. Here is one of the posters to give you an idea.

Right next to one of the posters a tree looked like it had a face. I’m not sure if this was intentional or accidental.

Te Anau has a surprising number of very good restaurants. We picked The Fat Duck and just barely managed to get reservations, on a Sunday evening. The place was hopping but we had a great meal. Jan discovered a great cider, which we will be looking for as we travel around.

And then it was back to the hotel, by the lake, along with many other people enjoying the evening.

As I’m writing this, I’m enjoying a cool breeze and watching the sun set, getting totally discombobulated because the sun is moving in the “wrong” direction. So confusing, but well worth it to be enjoying this instead of a snowstorm.

Did I mention that New Zealand if freakin awesome?