I’m hanging out in Wanaka. No wind. The hostel is nice, the people are good. But just no wind. Sometimes I’m happy that it’s sometimes so easy for me to be happy. Sometimes it annoys me. Today, for example. No wind. I’m hanging around all day, wandering through the city. Nothing new in Wanaka.
I sleep to videos in the living room. Cook my salmon. Chat a bit with good people at home. Work. Then I head out into the nightlife – it’s Friday after all. The first bar sells beer at prices below supermarket level. The second is well above. A drunken Maori twat knocks over the first half of my Heineken. The second half is stolen. I watch the people partying. My day?
The next day, kitesurfing is definitely over in Wanaka: no wind and the entire beach is closed for the Wanaka Ironman. I drive off. On the way is Arrowtown, another old gold mining settlement. Beautifully renovated, but still a bit Rothenburg ob der Tauber. I’m back in Queenstown by lunchtime. My car hire company had asked for an appointment for search engine advice. I arrange an appointment for the evening and drive back to Glenorchy.
Once again, there is no wind. The lake is as smooth as glass. I continue northwards on gravel tracks. Suddenly a rather modest sign announces: Paradise. 13 kilometres. I think it’s worth it. I drive and look and look and look…there’s no honey flowing anywhere, and 27 naked virgins aren’t jumping across the admittedly very beautiful mountain meadows. After 40 kilometres I turn round and head back.
In the evening: Paul, the head landlord is a nice guy, will probably give me a big order. When I say: 350,000 competitors, that’s nothing, he starts to laugh with relief and gives me a big Combi for the last day to replace my Mini with steel sticking out of the tyres.
Frank Woelky, born in 1973. Kitesurfer since 1998. Since 2006, I have been combining kitesurfing and web design on trips lasting several months off the beaten track.