In shades of Naked Gun, after we toured most of New Zealand and had our picnic, we got back to the hotel and Somchai saddled up and went horseback riding with the resident cowboy, Murray, and Leo his horse. I couldn't bear wearing the safety hat, so I skipped the horses and just hung around the lodge.

First stop on our tour was an aerial view of Lake Wakatipu. Our ultimate destination was Milford Sound, but en route we pretty much just pointed at some nice spot and landed, which was pretty cool.

Our suite continued the country western theme, complete with a huge stone fireplace and an enormous patio overlooking the lake. The exterior of the lodge was all stone and distressed wood, with huge windows everywhere to share the unparalleled views.

We stayed here for four nights, and quickly learned the routine. For dinner, guests gathered in the bar around 6.30 pm for drinks and to place dinner orders. There were usually a dozen or so guests plus the owners, a good size group conducive to a festive atmosphere. There was a foursome from Toronto that were there as long as we were, and were very nice. Others came and went and my journal goes into great detail about the pros and cons of each group, but we can skip that. After dinner the first night, we went back to our room and lit a fire, but unfortunately the fireplace had a problem, and the room filled with smoke and we set off the fire alarm. Not a good way to endear ourselves to the staff. They supposedly fixed the fireplace the next day, but we were too afraid of a repeat disaster that we never used it for the rest of the trip. Blanket Bay Lodge (8)-Room-9, Facilities-7, Service-7, Wow-5 (that view)

The hotel was opened by a wealthy American couple (same as Paratiho and a surprisingly large number of upscale lodges in New Zealand. Stolidog was just talking about moving to New Zealand someday, so maybe this will give him some idea of what to do when he gets there.) The American influence is much stronger here, with a very Brokeback look to the place. Actually the furnishing is similar to the style I had for a few years in my SoHo loft, which I adopted with great gusto, then moved and gave all this meticulously collected Americana to my sister Pomme, who proceeded to store it in a warehouse.

53. Queenstown/Lake Wakatipu

We continued driving through Queenstown, then kept driving along the shores of Lake Wakatipu down a 40 km dead end road to our hotel, Blanket Bay Lodge. We thought this 40 km trip would be a real pain every time we wanted to get to Queenstown, but it turned out we didn't really want to leave the hotel much, so it was no problem. The Lodge was outstanding, in an amazing, albeit remote, location. These photos are the view from our room at the Lodge. I have lots of hotel pics so I have to string the commentary out a bit...