My two favourite topics - skiing and wine

Firstly skiing - There's 3 main ski fields around Queenstown. To get to them you can either drive a rental car upto the carparks or catch the buses that leave from Queenstown. The closest fields are Remarkables and Coronet Peak. Coronet Peak offers night skiing but is probably the most challenging of the 3 fields as it's quite steep. Remarkable park is on the mountain just behind the airport so is easy to get too and has some long beginner and intermediate runs.

The furthest one away from Queenstown is Cadrona (closer to Wanaka). It's a big wide park with the full range of runs but it does take a while to get there! If you go there finish the day as we always do with a mulled wine at the Speights Ale House in the town of Cadrona.

You can rent gear either on the mountains or from the shops in Queenstown. If you're looking for current season high performance ski's goto Brown's otherwise just pick any shop and see if you like what they've got. Ski quality is usually pretty decent so you shouldn't have too much trouble. Ski fields get excellent snow bases so you don't get the badly damaged ski's that you find in some other countries.

Wine - Pick up a local wine map from your hotel so you know where you're going. The wineries stretch from just outside Queenstown out to Cromwell and south of Alexandra. If you've got a rental car it's a beautiful drive around and worth the effort as the wines are good. Personal favourites from the area are Pinot Noir's and big classic oaked Chardonnay's. Some of my favourite vineyards are Peregrine, Chard Farm, Rockburn and Bald Hills.