Day 21: Wanaka: Puzzles, Pizza, and Soccer

We started the day exploring Puzzling World. Expectations were low, but it ended up being fantastic. The outdoor maze required us to visit four different towers before finding the exit. For a bigger challenge, we chose to find the towers in the specified order. We paired up, and after over two miles of walking, ~5k steps and nearly two hours of time, we had all completed the mission.

Inside was just as neat. They had lots of optical illusions and outlined how they were tricking your eye. It included an Ames room, which Rob thought was especially cool.

We headed to town and found this amazing food truck area where we split some pizzas for lunch.

Rob and the boys played some soccer in town while I scouted out the shops. Then the boys and I did some shopping while Rob picked up our groceries. We finished the night with more family soccer before heading home for dinner and relaxing before bedtime.

Wanaka was the toughest town for us to find accommodations in. Despite trying to book everything months in advance this town was already sold out. We both kept checking the booking site nearly daily and finally something came up just a couple weeks before we left. It ended up being a new listing with no reviews, but we knew we needed to go for it. I am guessing the owners of the unit were surprised to get a booking within hours of posting their new place. Turns out it is newly constructed and met our needs perfectly, contrasting with our previous accommodations, which were fine but not nearly as big or new.