The Road to Glenorchy

My wife and I love to travel. For us, it is a time to unwind and be free from negativities and toxicities of work. In New Zealand, if you have your own vehicle, it is easier to have a tour of the country as you can drive to most of the beautiful places, and there’s no traffic (except in Auckland and other major cities). There’s a bigger chance you’ll get stuck in traffic not because of other cards but because of cattle crossing the roads. When we have the chance, we try to visit a particular town or city or region and explore the beautiful places and points of interests in that area. And as we treat New Zealand being our home, I like to showcase the natural beauty of this country in the Southern Hemisphere.

This will be my first post in the travel category and as I will showcase the blue skies and waters of New Zealand. For this maiden travel post, I will feature our trip to Glenorchy. Originally, we stayed in Queenstown, a popular tourist destination in the South Island. As we rented our own car and I am comfortable in driving, we put the visit to Glenorchy in our itinerary.

Glenorchy is located about 45 kilometers from the town of Queenstown, in the South Island in New Zealand. This small, quaint town has a population of less than 400 and main livelihood is farming. It lies between two national parks and that fact alone gives the impression of the place’s natural grandeur. The following are a few photos we took along the way as we head. The stunning views alongside the highway make the journey as equally enjoyable as the destination.


The main highway going to Glenorchy traverses along the coast of Lake Wakatipu. The scenic drive provides magnificent views of the Southern Alps towering along side the lake. While I am amazed with the views, still, you need to focus more on the road as vehicles of all types in varying speeds pass this road. Locals mostly drive at high speeds since they use the road almost on a daily basis. Contrastingly, tourists, particularly from outside New Zealand, drive at slower speeds, and many of them are driving campervans.


This is the view from Wilson Bay, one of the first stops when driving to Glenorchy. As it is already late afternoon when we stopped there, there were just the two of us which made it a perfect moment to take photos in all directions.


This is Mrs Wholly’s General Store, which is most probably the most famous store in town. There’s a lot of stuff you can buy here - fresh local produce, souvenir items, shirts, and many more.


This is the iconic boat shed located near the wharf. This particular structure has become an iconic landmark of this town and many tourists pose to take a photo with the shed.


These are a couple of shots from the wharf and you'll see the magnificent views of the mountains and the serene lake. The reddish colors of the soil, the blueish color of the sky and water, the white colors of the clouds and snow of the mountain make it a picture-perfect palette.

There are actually other stops where you can just pull over and take photos - 7-mile Delta, 12-mile Delta, and Pigeon Island lookout, to name a few. But as we are rushing to get to Glenorchy before the sun sets in (we had a full day of activities before this drive), we decided to skip those areas.


If you're wondering what other activities we did in Glenorchy, there's nothing else. We literally drove over there just to take photos and appreciate the views. While there are other recreational activities available like walking and tramping, we had very limited time as we needed to go back to Queenstown for another prior engagement. Yes, as I have mentioned at the beginning of this post, this Glenorchy trip is just a part of a much-bigger itinerary --- our Queenstown trip. But that's for another post.

Thank you and I hope you like the photos. Feel free to leave your comments below.

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