A Middle Eastern man, believed to be billionaire English football club owner Sheikh Mansour, arrived in Queenstown yesterday.
The Otago Daily Times snapped a casually dressed man thought to be from Abu Dhabi striding from a Gulfstream G450 flanked by bodyguards into a waiting limousine van at Queenstown Airport last evening.
The man is said to be Manchester City owner Mansour bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, who is worth an estimated $40billion.
Sheikh Mansour, a politician and businessman, is one of 19 children in the world's richest royal family, Abu Dhabi's ruling Al-Nahyan family.
The Gulfstream stopped at Melbourne and Auckland, before landing in Queenstown just before 7pm.
Earlier in the afternoon, another private jet, a Bombardier 6000, flew in carrying some of the group's entourage, who were whisked off to their accommodation.
The ODT has been told the group is in the resort for four days and has rented five houses, including one of Queenstown's most expensive, the $20,000-a-night Copper House.
Preparations were being made yesterday morning, with mountain bikes being taken to several houses.
A security detail was evident early in the afternoon.
Queenstown Airport's third private jet for the day, a Gulfstream 5, flew in from Hawaii just before 8am.
