Venturers Amazing NZ ExperiEnce

​I was looking for a hike to do for my Queens Scout hike and had decided I wanted to do a hike different to what we have done nearby in the Sydney or Blue Mountains region. I found the Milford Track in New Zealand which looked amazing and decided to use it as my hike.

Nine months of hard work later we flew out to New Zealand. On January 9th eleven Belrose and Bayview venturers and my dad (our Venturer leader), mum and brother flew to Queenstown. We hired a minivan and drove to Te Anau to prepare for our hike - two days later we were at Te Anau Downs getting on a boat that would take us to the start of the Milford Track.
 
The track itself was more amazing than expected. We followed a river along most of the hike which was clear blue water and after deciding to swim we discovered it was freezing cold as well! Either side of the peak was through valleys which were surrounded by 2km tall mountains. Hiking in New Zealand was an amazing experience as there was so many things different to hiking in Australia.
 
After the hike we returned to Queenstown where we stayed in the local scout hall. We went jetboating, up the gondola (a big ski lift) and did the luge which was like a go carting race track down part of the mountain and many other things.
 
If anyone had the opportunity to organise an event like this I would highly recommend it, because despite the hard work that was needed to get it done the experience on a whole was absolutely amazing.

Emily Marsden