Things to do in Queenstown

Where it is and what it is

The town centre is a compact grid of a dozen streets between the lakefront and the base of Bob's Peak, and you can walk across it in ten minutes. Frankton, 8 km east along the lake, has the airport, the supermarkets and the cheaper motels. Arrowtown, a gold town from 1862 with about 2,900 people, is 19.5 km east; Glenorchy, at the head of the lake, is 45 km northwest along one of the best short drives in the country. The Māori name, Tāhuna, means a shallow bay or sandbank.

Two things about the lake. It is shaped like a lightning bolt, which is why the road to Glenorchy keeps turning corners, and it breathes: a standing wave called a seiche lifts and drops the water in Queenstown Bay by about 200 mm every 26.7 minutes, which locals will tell you is the heartbeat of a sleeping giant. The water is cold all year, and people swim anyway.

Things to do, and what our itineraries actually book

The menu is long enough to bankrupt a family, so here is what our tours pay for, with counts, and what we think of each. Our guide to 13 things worth doing in Queenstown has the longer version and the two we would skip.

• TSS Earnslaw and Walter Peak (170 itineraries): a coal fired steamship built in Dunedin, taken apart, carried by train to Kingston at the southern end of the lake and launched there in 1912. It crosses to a high country farm for a barbecue dinner and a farm show. Old fashioned, and the evening light on the water is the best in town.
• Shotover Jet (129): the jet boat in the Shotover canyons, running since 1965 and owned by Ngāi Tahu. Twenty minutes, very wet, and the spins are the point. Book the morning; the canyon is in shade by mid afternoon.
• Skyline gondola (85, plus 41 with three luge rides): up Bob's Peak to a terrace about 450 m above the lake. The first gondola ran in 1967; the ten seat cabins date from June 2023. The luge tracks run 1,600 m. Go up at four in summer and come down after dinner.
• Kawarau Bridge bungy: an 1880 suspension bridge 43 m above the river, the site of the first commercial bungy in November 1988. The jump is on 10 of our itineraries. Watching costs nothing and most people do exactly that.
• Dart River jet (53): from Glenorchy up a braided river into Mount Aspiring National Park, with a walk in the beech forest. The scenery beats the Shotover; the drive there is part of it.
• Walks: Queenstown Hill is two to three hours return from town. Ben Lomond is a full day with 1,438 m of climbing from the lakefront, or a shorter walk to the saddle from the top of the gondola. DOC's track page is honest about the effort. The guided three day Routeburn Track walk, 32 km from the Milford Road to the Routeburn valley near Glenorchy, is on 10 of our itineraries.
• Wine (36 on the Appellation tour): the Gibbston valley starts 25 minutes east, with vineyards between 320 and 420 m. Central Otago is the southernmost commercial wine region in the world and more than 80 percent of it is pinot noir.

Then there is Milford Sound, 288 km away. It is a thirteen hour coach day from here or a comfortable day from Te Anau, and 114 of our itineraries arrive in Queenstown from Te Anau for that reason.

How to get to Queenstown

Queenstown Airport is at Frankton, 8 km from the centre and ten to twenty minutes by road. Air New Zealand, Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia fly direct from Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and the Gold Coast, and there are domestic flights from Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch. The approach between the mountains is famous, and the airport closes at 10 pm, so late arrivals land in Christchurch instead. By road it is a long way from everywhere, which is part of the appeal.

What catches people out: the Crown Range road to Wānaka closes or needs chains after snow, and rental agreements sometimes exclude it in winter, so take the longer road through Cromwell when in doubt. The Lindis Pass ices in the shade. And in July school holidays or over Christmas, the 8 km from the airport can take half an hour.

How many days, and where to base yourself

Two nights is the minimum that does not feel like a stopover: one full day for the lake and the town, an evening for the Earnslaw or the gondola. Three lets you add Glenorchy or Arrowtown, which our guide to Glenorchy and Arrowtown argues are the two best things about Queenstown that are not in Queenstown. Ski trips want four nights or more; 24 of our itineraries stay five or longer, many of them ski holidays or Routeburn Track walks.

Base in the town centre if you want to walk to dinner and do not mind bar noise until late; on the slope above it for the view and a quieter night; in Frankton if you are on a budget and have a car; or in Arrowtown if you would rather have the mountains without the crowd. The other option is to sleep in Wānaka instead, an hour away and calmer, which we weigh up in Queenstown or Wānaka.

Skiing: the four fields

The season runs from about mid June to early October, and the town sits at 310 m with the ski fields between 1,160 and 1,940 m, so you look at snow from breakfast and rarely walk on it. Coronet Peak, 25 minutes away, was the country's first commercial field in 1947, tops out at 1,649 m, and runs night skiing on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday from July to mid September. The Remarkables, 24 km and about 45 minutes with the last 4 km unsealed, sits in a bowl at 1,622 to 1,943 m and suits families and learners. Cardrona, 50 minutes toward Wānaka, has the biggest area at 615 ha, from 1,670 to 1,894 m. Treble Cone, past Wānaka, is the steep one.

Our Queenstown packages bundle lift passes across the NZSki fields with the hotel and the transfers, and the ski buses from town remove the need for chains. Our guide to Queenstown in winter covers what the town is like under the snow line.

Weather and when to go

Queenstown is dry by New Zealand standards, about 721 mm of rain a year against nearly 7 m at Milford Sound three hours west. January averages a high of 22 °C and the lake days are long. July averages 8 °C by day and minus 1 °C overnight, with hard frosts, still mornings and some of the clearest skies of the year. April is our favourite month: the poplars and willows along the lake turn gold, the summer crowd has gone, and the weather is often settled. October and November are the windiest and least predictable. The MetService Queenstown forecast is the one to check; mountain weather changes fast and the gondola and the jet boats do close in high wind.

Where to stay: the properties our tours use

Scenic Suites Queenstown (64 itineraries) and Blue Peaks Lodge (56) are the two our tours use most, round the corner from each other on Stanley Street, a few minutes' walk up from the lake. Then come the Millennium Hotel Queenstown (48) and The Dairy, a small Naumi hotel near the gondola base (22), followed by the two Copthornes on Frankton Road, Lakeview (11) and Lakefront (11), the Ramada Central (10) and the Heartland Hotel (8). At the top end, a few trips use Azur Lodge (6) or Rosewood Matakauri (4), both luxury lodges and priced accordingly, and the guided Routeburn walk spends its two nights on the track at Lake Mackenzie Lodge and Routeburn Falls Lodge. Browse every tour through Queenstown to see which property goes with which trip.