Joe Dodgshun

"Irresponsible" freedom campers will no longer have the run of the Lakes District after the Queenstown Lakes District Council yesterday adopted its controversial Freedom Camping Control Bylaw.

The chairmen of three of Otago's four runanga (tribal councils) yesterday met the Queenstown Lakes District Council to discuss how the council and individual runanga might collaborate more closely.

Organisers of the hectic V 48-Hours film competition say people from all over the country are looking forward to seeing what film-makers in Queenstown and the wider region can come up with next weekend.

New Zealand's top junior skier, Taylor Rapley, may be back home in Queenstown, but is in no way, shape or form on holiday as she keeps her eye on the 2014 Winter Olympics.

None of Queenstown's oldest farms, featuring "very special" buildings erected as early as the 1860s, will be inspected for its restoration potential this winter.

A surge in the number of door-knockers during election year is not unusual, but this week it was due to a group of final-year geography students from the University of Otago surveying life in Queenstown and Arrowtown.

Five years after its inception, the Queenstown Resort College has grown from a modest operation catering for 11 students to a fully-fledged tertiary institution with a roll of just under 300. Joe Dodgshun speaks to graduate Vivian Lyngdoh (20), who is having an agonising wait for his visa before he can start his new job at the luxury Millbrook Resort, near Arrowtown.

The mountain biking season may be winding down as Queenstown enters the seasonal shadow, but work to develop tracks and move the resort towards becoming a biking mecca will carry on during winter.

A Queenstown bus side-swiped two parked vehicles in slippery conditions yesterday but no-one was hurt.

Plans for a green waste drop-off site in Arrowtown are closer to fruition after the project gained the support of a Queenstown Lakes District Council committee on Tuesday.

Queenstown snow-lovers only have a month to wait to make the first runs of the season, with the Coronet Peak skifield scheduled to open on June 4.

Flood protection to be built for the $42 million Project Shotover wastewater and sewerage facility could be done earlier than thought.

Five years from its inception, the Queenstown Resort College has grown from a modest operation catering for 11 students to a fully fledged tertiary institution with a roll of just under 300. Joe Dodgshun speaks to graduate Lucy Hayes (21), now an adventure cave guide for the Blackwater Rafting Company at the Waitomo Caves.

Although Fr Tony Harrison's six-month deployment to Timor-Leste as an army chaplain is drawing to a close, the Queenstown priest says the pace of activity remains the same.

The standard of house insulation in the Queenstown Lakes District is costing locals both in terms of health and money, a Queenstown consulting engineer says.