Dispensor's NZ vacation.

[griffin]

My lovable mascot Dispensor was really upset that I forgot to take him to BotCon in LA this year, so I had to make it up to him by organising a trip to one of our nearest neighbours - New Zealand.

(for those who don't know who/what 'Dispensor' is, it was a short-lived character in the 2007 Movie, that was born from a Mountain Dew dispensing machine at the end of the movie - and a single non-convertable figurine was released as the only toy of this character, which I use as my avatar in the header above)

My friend Jimmy (known as Counterpunch on this forum), came to my aid, because he knew how difficult Dispensor can be when he doesn't get what he wants or isn't the centre of attention.

Last year actually, Jimmy suggested a Snowboarding trip to NZ, but we never got around to it (and BotCon was late last year, so wouldn't have been able to fit both in). This year though, BotCon was real early, leaving me with more time to affort the NZ trip I had been hoping to do this year anyway (my 2009 resolutions were to go to NZ, visit the last two AUS capital cities I haven't been to yet, and pass 25 hundred TFs - so far, I've managed 2 out of 3). And why go to NZ snowfields instead of an Australian one? Well, believe it or not, the total cost of everything ends up actually being cheaper to go to NZ.

So back in August, a last minute NZ snow-trip package (flights, accomodation, car hire, snowgear hire) was arranged for the middle of September, and I even managed to get time off work (which was considered last-minute, so I could only get certain days off).

As such, we weren't able to be at the snowfields on a weekend, to try out the night skiing one of them had on offer (on Fridays). For those wondering, a small part of the ski field is flood lit, but would be interesting to be up at that altitude in semi-darkness (and not worry about being sunburnt).

I also figured that while we were in NZ, on the south island, we should try to meet up with forum member Zippo (near Dunedin). And closer to departure, I found out about the Cadbury factory in Dunedin, and decided that we MUST visit it.

So the plan was fly into Christchurch (north east of south island), drive to Queenstown (south west) for the snowfields, and then at the end of the week there, drive to Dunedin (south east) and back up to Christchurch to fly back to Brisbane).

Jimmy met at my place Saturday afternoon (12th Sep), and made our way by taxi to the airport for our 6.20pm flight to Christchurch (on the south island).

The taxi drivers are getting really bad, or we just had bad luck - the one to the airport missed the turn-off to the international terminal, while the one on the way back home followed a GPS, which took longer but was cheaper because it was the shortest distance (going through some back streets instead of some major roads most people would use).

The flight (Pacific-Blue) took 5 hours 20 minutes, arriving in Christchurch at a little before midnight NZ time (which is 2 hours ahead of Brisbane).

We grabbed our hire car, which was upgraded to a diesel 'offroad' Prado, which worked out to be a lot cheaper over there - diesel is priced at about 60% of unleaded petrol (worked out to be about AU80c per litre!). We almost used up 2 full tanks of fuel, saving us heaps.

So leaving Christchurch (north east of the south island), we headed for Queenstown (south west). It took about 6 hours, arriving just as dawn was breaking.

(to be continued, with pics)