Mountain Scene
June 29, 2021
Queenstown’s Arthurs Point is proving to be a property hotspot this year.
Since January there’ve been 18 property sales there, with half the properties selling for $1.2 million-plus the highest price, $1.65m, was paid for a six-bedroom Larkins Way home.
The only non-house sales were a section at Larchmont Close which went for $855,000 and a Powder Terrace apartment that sold for $765,000.
Tall Poppy Queenstown agent Ron Blunden, who lives in Arthurs Point, believes some house values there have risen about $200,000 this year alone.
That in turn has triggered a much higher number of sales than you’d usually see, he says.
The making of a tourism magnate
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Mountain Scene
By TRACEY ROXBURGH
You could almost hear the sighs of relief at 4pm on Tuesday in Queenstown.
After holding the collective breath for more than a year, the resort was finally able to exhale as Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced a trans-Tasman bubble will open from 11.59pm on April 18.
The first flight from Australia into Queenstown in more than a year will be operated by Qantas, from Sydney, landing in the resort about 2.30pm on April 19.
Air New Zealand will resume its international flights the following day.
But most in the Whakatipu are expecting a slow burn, initially, before the resort’s international pulse starts racing again in July, coinciding with both the New Zealand and Australian winter school holidays.
Mountain Scene
Unsustainable occupancy levels have forced a prominent Queenstown hotel to be mothballed while the borders remain closed.
A spokesman for the Millennium Hotel, on Frankton Road, says it’s part of a consolidation plan while international tourists are shut out.
Mountain Scene understands the doors will shut on Sunday there’s no reopening date yet.
‘‘Our two Copthorne hotels in Queenstown remain open and we look forward to welcoming guests now and into the future to these hotels,’’ the spokesman says.
‘‘Having recently completed building works at Copthorne Hotel Lakefront we will take this opportunity to make improvements to the Millennium Hotel Queenstown before reopening at a later date.’’
Noelene Tait. PICTURE: EMILY ADAMSON
Hundreds turn out to pay their respects to Noelene Tait, 84, who died after a crash on Frankton Road on January 14 while on her way home from the library in Queenstown.
One of the original members of the Arrow Miners Band, Noelene loved Irish music and used to go to The Fork and Tap in Arrowtown and play on Wednesday nights.
The former theatre nurse at Kew Hospital, now Southland Hospital, in Invercargill moved to Queenstown 21 years ago after her late husband, Peter, died.
Noelene was heavily involved in the community and spent a huge amount of time entertaining residents at resthomes in Queenstown, either playing music for them or playing cards with them.
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