Puzzling World

February 18,2017

 We went to visit Puzzling World in Wanaka the next morning.  It was very fun.  A very interesting "museum" of sorts.

We started with their maze.  We had to get to 4 different towers, all different colors, then find our way out.  It was much harder than it looked.  Ava found this one below all by herself when she got lost from Alyssa and me.  I never found my way to the Green Tower.  My impatient self got very frustrated.  We eventually reconnected with Ava, but were lost from Brady and the big girls for quite a while.  Between all of us, we found all the towers, but we didn't each find them all.  We gave up and went the inside of the museum to ease our confusion.

Started off with some illusions and electrical fright....

Next... on to the Tilted House.  I was immediately nauseated upon entering.  It was so strange.  It was on a slant and everything was tipped or seamed to be tipped one way.   

Can you tell which was the house tilted?

Link to the Tilted Room Video 1

Link to the Tilted Room Video 2

Link to the Tilted Room video 3

This was a cool illusion room.  Alyssa is in the left corner and Ava in the right corner.  Really, they are nearly the same size without this illusion.  Ava looks so tiny :)

Now Alyssa is the tiny one!!

No, their real size... with an addition in the background.

Link to the Illusion Room Video

Savannah on the left and Kayla on the right.  Finally, Savannah is feeling tall.

Now Kayla is feeling REALLY tall with her head hitting the ceiling

Link to the Moving Faces video

Can you see the illusion in the posters below.  Two words in one!!

Love this one.... Can you see how the reflection of the word makes another word that it connected to it?

The lobby had lots of interesting puzzles in it... not put together kind of puzzles, but brain puzzles.  Very fun.

We were told when we checked in to check out the bathrooms, they even had illusions in them.  They didn't disappoint.  When you went into the bathroom lobby area there was this painting on the end of the wall.  They are Romans with their drawers down sitting on the "pot".  Then, along the wall there were real pots (with a sign that read not to really use these pots to go to the bathroom).  Ha Ha!!

Don't fall girls!!  We'll never get you out of the sewer!

Some of the toilet seats.  Nobody would use the barbed wire/spider on so I ended up on that one.

Holding up the Leaning Tower of Wanaka is HARD WORK!!

Fun times at Puzzling World!!

Wanaka, New Zealand and Lake Hawea

After our time in Mt. Aspiring National Park we headed to our next stop off point, Wanaka, New Zealand.  Wanaka is a cute tourist town on the southern tip of Lake Wanaka.

We didn't spend a lot of time near the lake as we knew it was cold and we were also in town at the same time as a Triathlon so there were areas that were cold.  We were going to be staying in a Hotel by Lake Hawea just north of Wanaka and would try out the water there.

When we got to Wanaka, we were all starving and looking for something familiar for the girls, but local as well.  We found this cute little restaurant that had good reviews for pizza so we decided to try it out.  The inside was so fun.  

The pizza was great!  I loved this combo pizza with lots of veggies on it: even celery!!  Everyone else picked that one off, but I loved it.  

Then we needed a Gelato stop after looking through some of the shops.  Yum yum!!

Kayla had to get Vanilla Bean in honor of her bestie that she was missing, Lauren Bean.  She had to give me a sad face while eating her vanilla (Lauren) bean

We went and found our hotel at Lake Hawea.  It was a beautiful lake, so clear and calm.... and of course cold.  They were hoping for Lake Austin water, but NO WAY.  Not till we get back to Austin girls.

We let them "get in" as far as their clothes would let them.  Funny how they love the challenge of getting themselves in as far as they can stand it.  Pants hiked up as far as they would go.  ha ha

The view from our room was a lot better than the room itself.  It had an upstairs loft though where all the girls slept, which was nice to have.

The next day after our morning adventure we let the girls get in their swimsuits to get in the water.  They didn't get in much further than the day before though, but the opportunity was there for the taking if they wanted.

See how clear the water is!!

Cold Kayla????

Ava found a rock to sit on.  :)

Savannah warming up on the rocks.  The air was warm, but the water cold.