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by Anthony Hill, Coastguard Queenstown

Ask most people where Bob’s Peak is and they will point up to the top of the Skyline Gondola. Wrong. Up behind the gondola are Bowen Peak and Ben Lomond. You have to head out to the Moke Lake road to drive up beside the real Bob’s Peak. Point to the hill towering over Kelvin Heights and they will call it Deer Park Heights. No, that’s the commercial venture using Peninsula Hill. Head down Gorge Road and you are in Boydtown! Did you know the Edith Cavell Bridge was named by force of public opinion and was originally refused as a name. Do we really know where we are? I recently asked people to meet me at Jubilee Park. Blank stares.

And don’t get me started about how “Beside Frankton” got to call itself “Queenstown (not) Central”. I propose we all actively call Hendo’s Hole (yes, I remember) Frankton Central and see if we can make that stick.

When I moved to Queenstown last century, Frankton was away, out of town. Now the Basin is filling up. Perhaps Frankton is now “central”, and Queenstown is now just a trendy district. As we have grown to city status, perhaps it is time to rename ourselves Whakatipu City. (For quite a while I referred to Queenstown as Conestown, now that moniker belongs to BP roundabout – aka Frankton beside Frankton Central).

Come to beautiful Whakatipu, dine in the trendy lakeside Queenstown, wander the quaint streets of Arrowtown, shop in the busy Frankton Central whatever-it-is, cycle through the lifestyle mansions in the Basin, head down the southern corridor…

Another issue I have noticed around Whakatipu City is a confusion with heights. Myths such as that Arrowtown is the same altitude as the Skyline top station. Confusion that is not helped by bad data on the internet. Searches for the height of both give quite a variety of answers, especially for Arrowtown ranging from 390m - 671m.

How deep is our lake? Well, it varies but the bottom is below sea level. On some charts it shows around 370m deep but others show the depth 390m. I have seen 394m on a boat sounder and would not be surprised if there were pockets of 400m. The mean lake level is 310m above sea level. So that gives you 60~80m below sea level, which itself is deeper than most harbours and coastal areas around New Zealand.

When I was recently holidaying in the Gold Coast, I took my binoculars and enjoyed watching pods of dolphins and whales from the balcony of the hotel. Here in Queenstown I see ‘sharks’ frolicking in the lake. Makes me want to create a viral Lock Ness style Lake Taniwha myth to get people watching the lake too. Let’s spread some more misinformation… or maybe not. Before AI can muddle us up with its own hallucinations, perhaps we just need to get our names straight and our facts clear, and keep our tourists well informed.