Hey, everyone! I made it to Queenstown – as I mentioned last week. It is so incredibly beautiful here. I’ve never lived long term in a location where I’m surrounded by massive mountains. It is very new for me, but I love it.

Wellington to Queenstown

I touched on this a little bit in my last post, but wanted to expand on the transition from Wellington to Queenstown a little more this week. I did really like Wellington. It has an alternative vibe, a city full of weirdoes. Nice walking tracks and the ocean nearby.

I’ve heard for a long while now that the North Island and South Island are completely different – they’re almost like different countries. I can see why. The South Island is highly regarded as the superior island – at least by other travelers I’ve met. The mountains down here are massive.

On my day of arrival, it was overcast, so I wasn’t able to get the best view of the mountains surrounding Queenstown. And still, I had a feeling I was in for a treat. I’ve been able to experience some gorgeous, sunny days in my first week here. As the sun starts to set, the mountains seem less three-dimensional. With the fading sunlight, they appear to flatten. It looks like a painting. Often when I’m walking around, I can’t believe I am able to have this as my backdrop for the foreseeable future. Incredible!

First Week of Work

I arrived to Queenstown on a Sunday and checked into my staff accommodation around noon. It’s dorm-style, but I’m in a three bed room with only one other dude at the moment. Such an upgrade from the six, eight, ten, twelve, sixteen-bed hostel rooms I’ve stayed at before! And the nice thing is that everyone else here is working, too, so they’re not really causing havoc throughout the night. Yay!

I started work on Tuesday. Normally, I would feel nervous ahead of my first day, but I’ll touch on the reason that I wasn’t in the Reflections section later.

My first week went really well. I don’t think I’m technically allowed to go into the specifics of the role or the name of the company, but it’s working at a hotel, coordinating client events via email. It’s not completely dissimilar from the industry I used to work in.

After my first day, I actually left work smiling. Breaks are encouraged – 2x 15min breaks, 1x 30min lunch break. And lunch is provided by the kitchen staff. Yahoo! When 5.30pm rolled around, my boss said, “It’s 5.30. Time to go!” I don’t think I’ve ever experienced that in my entire working career. Always, I’ve had to stay late or wait to get permission to go home. How nice to be able to leave on time!

I like the people a lot and while surely it will be busy at times, I think I am going to do a great job and I’ll be able to maintain a low-stress headspace.

I couldn’t have asked for a better first week at work.

Queenstown Hill

Aside from the gorgeous views, there are some solid hiking trails in Queenstown. I haven’t had a chance to go on too many of them since I was working most of the week. The Monday before starting work, I did end up walking up to the Queenstown Hill summit. It’s a small mountain behind downtown Queenstown, but the incline is a killer. The first time I went up, I took my time and had some breaks along the way.

Shortly before the summit, there is a sculpture called Basket of Dreams that is sort of like a metal bird’s nest that people sit in and pose in. The area has the most spectacular views of the surrounding mountains.

Upon reaching the summit, I was stunned. What a great introduction to Queenstown on my second day – getting a panoramic view of the area. Amazing!

I returned to Queenstown Hill the other evening. I pulled out my headtorch, last used in Australia, and intended to head up to the Basket of Dreams to see if it was a good spot for future aurora hunting.

It took me about an hour to get to the Basket of Dreams from my accommodation, but boy… I was huffing and puffing the whole way. The entire walk is essentially an incline. I didn’t stop to rest but next time I will because I was sweating haha. It was absolutely a workout.

I saw a possum along the way. It scurried into the bush as I was walking up the path. I can’t remember if I mentioned or not but possums are invasive here and the attitude is… well, to kill them. They eat bird eggs and a lot of the native birds here lay their eggs in the ground – kiwi included. Kiwi are endangered and are New Zealand’s national bird, so there is a desperation to eliminate the invasive species from New Zealand.

No one else was on the trail. It must have been about 10.30pm. The sun doesn’t set until quite late here at the moment. It was a little chilly at the top, but I had two jumpers and a warm faux-fur vest on. I took some test shots with my phone to see if it would be dark enough to try and capture the aurora one evening. It seemed to me that the light pollution from the city below would spill through a little bit. It looked kind of hazy.

I ended up laying down in the basket, looking up at the stars. I watched passing satellites and saw a shooting star or two. I stayed for some time but then went back home since it was getting late. One of my next purchases is a new headtorch. This one is much too dim for night hiking.

Queenstown Gardens

The Queenstown Gardens begin right next to my place of employment. It’s an easy escape into a more nature-y area. I saw another possum there one evening. They also have an apiary with bee hives! So many bees buzzing around that spot. It was really cool to see.

There are a number of benches along the Queenstown gardens – it is essentially a small peninsula that is surrounded by Lake Wakatipu.

One day, I saw a sign that highlighted the Australian crested grebe – a water bird that is endangered here in New Zealand. Apparently, it’s quite popular in some European countries, but it’s now extinct on the North Island. Sad! They build floating nests for their babies, but oftentimes they build them to attach to the back of boat motors. Problematic, obviously.

Conservation efforts have been made to build floating wood planks with pre-built nests to encourage the birds to incubate their eggs there instead. Yay! My mission the other day was to try and find one of these grebes. And I did! They are really cute, with their crazy-looking hair.

I’ll certainly be back to Queenstown Gardens. It’s easy to get to, has easy walking trails, and it’s a great place for picnics or to read books.

Oh, and lots of little birds hanging around!

Aurora Australis

One of the main things I was excited about being in Queenstown is that it’s far enough south where seeing the aurora australis is certainly possible if the conditions are right.

I mentioned I had gone to Queenstown Hill to scope out the area at night. I’d also gone to a spot called Aurora Point – that one is definitely the winner in terms of nearby aurora-hunting locations. It is dark enough and far away from the light pollution of the city.

There are a number of things that factor into spotting the aurora. The most important factors are… is it dark enough? Is it overcast or is the sky clear/only partly cloudy? Was there any recent solar activity that would result in the aurora?

Luckily, I have some experience in aurora hunting. From Iceland to Norway and Sweden and even in Tasmania. I’ve been lucky enough to see the aurora a number of times – but never at the desired intensity. Usually, it appears as silver/grey to the naked eye. Maybe a pale green. Hopefully, I’ll finally be able to see a vividly colorful display here in Queenstown if the conditions are right! It is possible.

I’ve recently learned of a website called Glendale, that has all sorts of data about solar activity and auroras. They are incredibly difficult to predict, but the nice thing about the site is that people can post if they’ve seen the aurora or not. So if I see other people are seeing it in nearby areas, that’s a good time to have a look for myself!

Funnily enough, on my second night in Queenstown, I walked outside of town and went looking for the aurora… sure enough, a purple glow showed up on my phone camera when doing a 10sec exposure!

It was an overcast night so I didn’t stay out for long. I couldn’t see much of anything with my naked eye. The sky behind the mountains appeared to be slightly bright, but I wasn’t sure. Apparently, the night prior there was some wicked activity and people got incredible pictures. It was very overcast that night in Queenstown, so I hadn’t gone looking.

Still – to capture a picture (albeit crappy… I’m going to buy a phone tripod so hopefully that helps) of the glow from a distant aurora was really cool! In the future, when activity is very strong, I’m going to go to Aurora Point and have a look. Hopefully, I’ll have some really incredible displays to witness in the coming months. Fingers crossed!

Miscellaneous

I forgot to mention last week that on my flight from Wellington to Queenstown… they ended up confiscating one of my lighters as I was going through security. I was a little bummed because I always carry it around with me – my parents got it for me as a souvenir from their trip to Germany. I still have another lighter that they gave me that I carry with me but that one is a little more sentimental. The reason they confiscated it is that it was one of the lighters where you push the button down to ignite it. Odd – I’ve carried it with me on flights for years and have never had an issue until now! Alas. RIP lighter. I guess my parents will just have to go to Greece now and get me a new lighter! 😉

On my first day of work, the fire alarm went off and we all had to go outside until the fire department came. We’re still unclear on what it was, but seems that a toaster started smoking and set off the alarm. Yikes! Can’t say it was a boring first day, though!

The population of Queenstown is pretty small – it has about 30,000 people in the area. Quite small! And yet, I think it will offer me the space I need to work regularly on my art, writing, meditation, and self-care overall.

Queenstown is abbreviated as QT. If you’re hip, you’ll know QT is sometimes short for “cutie.” You might say I’m a qt living in QT.

Art of the Week

Trying something a little new. Shapes on skin instead of the trippy pattern I’ve been doing for ages. I like it! We’ll see where it goes.

Reflections

I titled this post A New Career in a New Town after a David Bowie song. If you caught that reference, good on ya! Love that song… and Bowie.

Earlier in this post, I mentioned I would explain why I wasn’t feeling very nervous about my first day at work. During my first few weeks in New Zealand, I was really stressed about finding work. Even before getting here, honestly. And I just stress about things so much to begin with. At times, it feels like a frequency that is just constantly vibrating through me. I always seem to find something to stress about.

So… I decided that I can’t do that anymore. I try to pray to my Higher Power (the energy of the universe, God, whatever) before I go to bed each night, and I’ve started saying, “God, please take away my anxieties, my worries, my stresses, because I just can’t deal with them anymore.” I really can’t! It is too much and takes too much of my headspace. I’ve also started to, when journaling, write to myself as if I’m a friend. Steve, you can do this, you’re a hard worker and great at what you do, etc. Because I am always supportive and encouraging of my friends and family, but not so much towards myself. I’m trying to reframe my mindset to be more positive overall. I think it’s working so far!

I don’t have much planned the following week. It is Sunday now and I’m having sort of an errand-y day. Surely, I’ll go for a walk at some point. Stay tuned for what comes next!

Until then – sending you all my love. xx