Skippers Canyon

Skippers Canyon is a historic and scenic gorge, some 22 kilometres in length, that is located several kilometres north of Queenstown. Today accessed from Queenstown via the same road that leads to Coronet Peak skifield, Skippers Canyon houses the Shotover River, one of New Zealand's richest gold-bearing rivers which was named by William Gilbert Rees. Rees, his wife Frances and brother-in-law Nicholas von Tunzelmann were the first European settlers in and near where Queenstown is now located. Once a busy goldmining area, Skippers Canyon was accessed by Skippers Road, which is today one of New Zealand's better known scenic roads. The main New Zealand road where rental car insurance is not honoured if driven on, Skippers Road is mostly one-way, narrow and steep with sheer drops of several hundred metres. Apart from its goldmining history, Skippers Canyon was also the site where electricity was first generated at a place called Bullendale, a small former goldmining settlement some 4 hours walk from the farthest end of Skippers Road.

New Zealand

New Zealand (/njuːˈziːlənd/ new-ZEE-lənd, Māori: Aotearoa [aɔˈtɛaɾɔa]) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. The country geographically comprises two main landmasses – that of the North Island, or Te Ika-a-Māui, and the South Island, or Te Waipounamu – and numerous smaller islands. New Zealand is situated some 1,500 kilometres (900 mi) east of Australia across the Tasman Sea and roughly 1,000 kilometres (600 mi) south of the Pacific island areas of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga. Because of its remoteness, it was one of the last lands to be settled by humans. During its long isolation, New Zealand developed a distinctive biodiversity of animal, fungal and plant life. The country's varied topography and its sharp mountain peaks, such as the Southern Alps, owe much to the tectonic uplift of land and volcanic eruptions. New Zealand's capital city is Wellington, while its most populous city is Auckland.

Somewhere between 1250 and 1300 CE, Polynesians settled in the islands that were to become New Zealand, and developed a distinctive Māori culture. In 1642, Abel Tasman, a Dutch explorer, became the first European to sight New Zealand. In 1840, representatives of the British Crown and Māori Chiefs signed the Treaty of Waitangi, making New Zealand a British colony. Today, the majority of New Zealand's population of 4.5 million is of European descent; the indigenous Māori are the largest minority, followed by Asians and Pacific Islanders. Reflecting this, New Zealand's culture is mainly derived from Māori and early British settlers, with recent broadening arising from increased immigration. The official languages are English, Māori and New Zealand Sign Language, with English predominant.

Skipper

Skipper or skippers may refer to:

Nautical and military

Sports

People

Canyon

A gorge or canyon (cañon, old spelling occasionally still used) is a deep ravine between pairs of escarpments or cliffs and is the most often carved landscape by the erosive activity of a river over geologic timescales. Rivers have a natural tendency to cut through underlying surfaces so will eventually wear away rock layers to lessen their own pitch slowing their waters; given enough time, their bottoms will gradually reach a baseline elevation—which is the same elevation as the body of water it will eventually drain into. This action, when the river source and mouth are at much different base elevations will form a canyon, particularly through regions where softer rock layers are intermingled with harder layers more resistant to weathering.

A canyon may also refer to a rift between two mountain peaks, such as those in ranges including the Rocky Mountains, the Alps, the Himalayas or the Andes. Usually a river or stream and erosion carve out such splits between mountains. Examples of mountain-type canyons are Provo Canyon in Utah or Yosemite National Park in California's Sierra Nevada. Canyons within mountains, or gorges that have an opening on only one side are called box canyons. Slot canyons are very narrow canyons, often with smooth walls.

Zealand

Zealand, also Sealand (Danish: Sjælland; pronounced [ˈɕɛˌlanˀ]), is the largest (7,031 km²) and most populated island in Denmark with a population just under 2.5 million, representing about 45% of the country's total population.

It is the 96th-largest island in the world by area and the 35th most populous. It is connected to Funen by the Great Belt Bridge, to Lolland, Falster (and Germany from 2021) by the Storstrøm Bridge and the Farø Bridges. Zealand is also linked to Amager by five bridges. Zealand is linked indirectly, through intervening islands by a series of bridges and tunnels, to southern Sweden.

Copenhagen, the capital of Denmark, is located partly on the eastern shore of Zealand and partly on the island of Amager. Other cities on Zealand include Roskilde, Næstved and Elsinore.

The island is not connected historically to the Pacific nation of New Zealand, which is named after the Dutch province of Zeeland.

Mythological origins

In Norse mythology as told in the story of Gylfaginning, the island was created by the goddess Gefjun after she tricked Gylfi, the king of Sweden. She removed a piece of land and transported it to Denmark, which became Zealand. The vacant area was filled with water and became Mälaren. However, since modern maps show a similarity between Zealand and the Swedish lake Vänern, it is sometimes identified as the hole left by Gefjun.