Chinese Settlement, Arrowtown and small cafes

On our final day in Queenstown area, we visited Arrowtown, a sleepy and historic town on the Arrow River just further up the road from the Shooter Bridge area.  The town has seen many ebbs and flows in population - it was the center of the NZ Gold Rush back in the 1800s, and grew to a population of as many as 7000 people.  By the mid-1900s the population was back under 200, and once again has grown to over 2500 people with the birth of a high-end tourism industry.  At the center of town is a preserved or refurbished historic main street, which has the appearance of a turn of the 20th century town (apparently all development and refurbishment is strictly controlled so that the appearance of the town has a historic feel.) On the outskirts of the town lies a preserved Chinese miner settlement of small homes and cabins, and then much further out of town the area is home to a few upscale resorts, golf courses, and cafes.  With all of this set in a beautiful mountain valley, it is quite a sight.

We spent a little time downtown, seeing the old post office, general stores and then the town museum, which had excellent local history exhibits.  Then we continued our walk out to the Chinese settlement.  In the mid-19th century, a wave of Chinese and European immigrants arrived to mine the hills for gold, and the Chinese, being subject to quite a bit of discrimination and dubious legal equality, established their own residential area just on the outside of town.  Here is a shot of Bamma and Grandad in front of the refurbished general store for the settlement.

It is remarkable the conditions and amount of space that they lived in.  Here is Lindsay in front on one cabin.

And I think Grammy and Grampa Jeans home is slightly larger than this one.

On our way back out of town and to our next destination (Te Anua and Fjordlands NP) we stopped at a roadside cafe.  Small cafes such as this are such a prevalent feature of New Zealand country towns, and this one was a charmer.  Set in an old farm home, with gardens and outdoor eating areas, we had meat pies, sandwiches and ginger beer and coffees.  What a good looking group of people!

And here is one of Pete and Jen, well fed and relaxed.