Geography in Queenstown and the Red Zone!

The Year 13 class spent three days in Queenstown working hard towards our final internal around analysing a contemporary event from a Geographic point of view. 

We have been looking into the Motatapu endurance race between Wanaka and Arrowtown. We met with Owner/organiser Gemma who answered all the students questions about the event and even gave the students some free merchandise from the event. We also caught up with the Queenstown Lakes District Council to learn about event planning from their point of view.

The trip also allowed us to learn more about the Queenstown’s Tourism history to prepare us for our exam in which we will look into the impact the industry has had on the people and natural landscapes of the area. The Queenstown Resort College and Council were able to provide us with a huge amount of detail into this.

Finally, among all of the singing and chatter in the school van, we spent some time up at Skyline and the Luge, learning who was super aggressive and who was afraid of heights! 

Overall it was a fantastic trip, with a huge thanks to Mrs Prout for taking time out her busy schedule to come along, and also to Mikayla-Rose Sutton and Hunter Wright for spotting the tourists who had crashed into a ditch near Twizel, so we could stop and give them a helping hand.

The Year 11 class spent a day in the Red Zone in Christchurch.

After two weeks of learning about how it was created it was great to get into the area itself to see how the space is being used. We were expertly guided between the different areas by a Christchurch City Council park ranger Ange, who explained all of their plans for the greenspace.

The students also did a great job building up the courage to interview people within the Red Zone to find out what they were hoping the area would be used for going forward.

It was a great day, with many of the students expressing their appreciation for getting out of the classroom.

Mr. Price