Comfort well worth the trek

Amazing views, all the modcons – Adam Dudding was happy to settle in to relative luxury in Queenstown after walking the Routeburn Track.

The place

Te Kohanga Rua is a self-contained two-bedroom house in Queenstown. It’s managed by Touch of Spice, a boutique accommodation outfit with ultraluxurious listings, including remote multi-room mansions with tennis courts and swimming pools and resident chefs, and cost as much as $38,000 a night (not a typo). Fortunately, Touch of Spice also has a secondary slate of perfectly lovely listings that are much more within reach of those of us who forgot to become Hollywood stars, Russian oligarchs or hedge-fund traders. Te Kohanga Rua is one of those.

Location

The single-storey house is one of a line of homes along Frankton Rd, a couple of minutes’ drive (15 minutes’ lakeside stroll) from the town centre. It directly overlooks Lake Wakatipu’s Frankton Arm, so you get 180-degree views of lake, snowsprinkled mountains and great southern skies from the sitting room (and one of the bedrooms).

If all that nature bores you, you can also gaze at the parade of idiot tourists in stupid jetboats doing aquatic doughnuts before scudding up the Frankton Arm. The airport is less than 10 minutes’ drive in the opposite direction from the town centre, and there’s a bus-stop just outside.

The space

My teenage son and I had a couple of nights in Queenstown immediately after tramping the Routeburn Track.

After three nights of sleeping on thin bedrolls, drinking water from streams, eating campingcooker risotto and reading by the light of a headtorch, washing not at all and looking in mirrors never (as well as a forced break from phonecalls, social media, Netflix and world news) we were much saner and healthier than usual, but also very excitable in the presence of the conveniences of modern life.

So perhaps the average resident of of Te Kohanga Rua won’t get as enthused as we did about the running hot and cold water, the electric lighting, the hot shower, the shiny new fridge, dishwasher, washing machine and dryer, the elements that didn’t need lighting with a match, not to mention the soft beds and sofa, the huge TV with Sky, Netflix, Apple TV and a Sonos sound system, and a standalone can-opener that wasn’t part of a multi-purpose Swiss-made device that could also clean hooves.

Of more interest to non-trampers, probably, is the fact that the roomy, open-plan sitting room and kitchen were clean and modern with funky decor (we can overlook the single ‘‘Live Love Laugh’’ motto on a decorative water bottle), and the views were fabulous enough that we didn’t bother with the TV at all (apart from establishing that the sound system did, indeed, generate a lot of sound when you cranked up the volume). There was a small patio with garden furniture and an umbrella, but December in Queenstown was unseasonably chilly, so we didn’t try that out.

Stepping out

You’re in Queenstown, so there’s always plenty to do, some of it pricey, some of it extremely pricey. Having spent days walking, we were feeling lazy, so did very little: a water’s-edge walk into town ($0); a few meals with some lovely new friends we’d made on the Routeburn; and – full disclosure – we became signed-up members of the idiot tourist club by taking a spin in a stupid jetboat (which cost $118 for 25 minutes and would’ve cost more if I hadn’t successfully argued that my son was an exceptionally immature 17-year-old and thus eligible for the child rate). Our distance from the town centre felt ideal: we were safely away from the bass-thumping booze-fuelled yahooing that can ruin your sleep if you’re bang in the middle, yet close enough that walking home or jumping in a cheap cab made sense.

The food

Touch of Spice kindly left a half-dozen eggs, a loaf of sourdough, some tomatoes, an avocado and some posh bottled water, plus the cupboards were stocked with all the fancy oils and condiments you could desire, so both mornings we spent not a dime, yet breakfasted like non-house-hunting Millennials. In town we were very happy with what we got at Fergburger (a two-block queue but they’re so efficient we were eating in under half an hour), at Farelli’s Trattoria (good-value classic Italian), at Madame Woo (those hawker rolls really are good), at Mrs Ferg Gelateria, and Big Fig (‘‘slow food served fast’’ was an accurate motto).

Highlight

I’ve already mentioned the view twice – but seriously, if you could overcome the feeling that you should be out somewhere eating fancy food, catching a gondola, dangling from a bungee cord, dodging boulders in the Shotover or licking gelato, you could do worse than plonking yourself down at the sitting room table at Te Kohanga Rua and spending the day watching the colours change as the light and the weather move across the Remarkables.

Lowlight

We were on holiday. It was all good.

Essentials

Te Kohanga Rua’s two bedrooms (one with a split king) mean up to four people could stay here pretty comfortably, as long as the relational logistics work. January rates start at around $340 a night. Visit Touch of Spice to check availability and pricing, or to check out its other Queenstown properties.

Adam Dudding and offspring stayed at Te Kohanga Rua as a guest of Touch of Spice (but he did pay for everything else, including flights from Auckland, all that food and the really expensive yet quite boring jetboat ride.)

There’s a lot to do in Queenstown, but you could always just sit here and look at the water and the hills.

The sitting room is spacious, with electronic gadgets galore, and did we mention the view?

Bedroom number one has lake views, and you could always make a play-hut from the dozens of spare pillows and cushions.

Running water, electric lights, flushing toilets – heaven after four days’ tramping and sleeping in a tent.