The River Wild

Today we finally had our horse ride! We were picked up by the stables at 8:30am and driven 45 minutes to Glenorchy, the same town at the north side of Lake Wakatipu that we went to yesterday. Dart Stables has 62 horses, all geldings, and eight of them were used for filming Lord of the Rings. There were two other people on our particular horse ride, both young men from Ethiopia.

We actually don't have as many photos today because even though Dallas brought two cameras on the ride, it was difficult getting them out for photographs. She has also learned to not bring the big camera next time because it ended up cutting her hands bouncing during the running parts of the trail.

Besides the beautiful scenery, the best part of the ride were the river crossings. The Rees river is the result of glacial runoff from a mountain that remains snow-covered all year long, which gives the river it's icy blue color. The river was about 2.5 feet at its deepest, so it didn't even reach our boots.

Cameron's horse Jackie was sort of a brat -- he kept kicking at Dallas's horse Harry.

So we tried to keep them separated.

While we had multiple river crossings, we also spent some time riding through fields and small groves of willow trees.

When we got back to the stables and dismounted, we could barely walk! We're sure to be sore tomorrow!

After we got back to Queenstown, we ate at Fergburger, a very popular local burger joint. Dallas's burger was huge!

After lunch and some last minute souvenir shopping, we headed back to our hotel to take it easy for the rest of they day. Tonight is our last night in Queenstown, and in New Zealand. Tomorrow we fly all day back to Sydney, where we then have one more full day abroad. We will miss the wonderful Kiwis here.