Arrowtown

Arrowtown is 18 km from Queenstown, about twenty minutes by road, and it makes the easiest half-day trip out of town. It was a gold-mining settlement and has never entirely stopped looking like one — the original shops and miners' cottages still line Buckingham Street, and most of them are still in use.

What to do there

• Walk the Arrowtown Millennium Walk along the Arrow River. An easy 4.2 km loop of about an hour, starting near Dudley's Cottage. The same stretch of river played the Gladden Fields in The Fellowship of the Ring.
• Visit the restored Chinese miners' settlement at the western end of the village, by the river. It is small, free and the most affecting thing in Arrowtown.
• Pan for gold in the Arrow. People still find flecks of it, which is either the point or beside it.
• Walk Buckingham Street end to end, which takes about ten minutes and several stops.

More routes on the Queenstown walks and tramping page.

When to go

April, when the trees turn. Arrowtown's autumn colour is the one stretch of the year when the village is genuinely busy, and it is worth arriving early for a car park.

In winter it works as a base for the ski fields — Coronet Peak is the closest, and The Remarkables is a longer drive back past Queenstown. Evenings are quieter than town, which some people are looking for and others very much are not.

Getting there

Drive, or take the Orbus route 2 from Frankton Bus Hub. The Queenstown Trails also connect the two if you would rather ride.