Where are you coming from and what to study?

 

I'm at Otago. It's pretty sweet, good atmosphere, generally a bloody good school (#1 ranked in NZ), really good for what I'm doing, but as you probably know these choices often come down to what you wanna study.

 

As for riding, yea Canterbury is closer to a lot more hills. BUT, there is a huge skier/snowboarder community in Dunedin (plenty of student flats with jib set ups, comps in town etc). Queenstown and Wanaka are where you ride from Dunedin, they are 3-3.5 hours drive away. Between these two towns you have 5 hills to ride at: Coronet peak - great fun field, close to queenstown, awesome snowmaking and base facilities, really fun freeriding, kickerspots, good lifts, ok park; Remarkables, a little further from queenstown, gnarly freeriding (and super mellow terrain too), really good park, and the Stash, usually pretty good snow too. Closer to wanaka is cardrona - big area, good lifts, big base facilities, good park and pipe (like really good usually), but other than that most of the terrain is pretty mellow; Snowpark - across the valley from cardrona, all park, world class, the place to be for the show ponies haha, nah its all good. And then there is Treble cone - ages from queenstown but close to wanaka, big, reliable snow, all freeriding, but super expensive, and the top lift is new but just a fixed grip.

 

Dunedin may be a bit of a drive from the snow, but if you have no class on friday afternoons then that'll help heaps, and there are heaps of people around to carpool/share accom etc. Quite a few good shops in dunedin too to get gear sorted out.

Depends on what you want to study.

Student life is great and cheap, but super cold in Dunedin.

Queenstown is awesome though.

 

Christchurch is pretty cold too I guess.. The uni is pretty decent though and the city is great.

 

You can stay ON SNOW for $10 at coronet if you are a student... And queenstown nightlife blows bogan-ville christchurch out of the water (so does dunedin for that matter...)

Yea Queenstown gets busy during winterfest (although the hills are quiet coz everyone is in town), and school holidays, but that's to be expected. Other than that crowds are pretty mellow. Won't find a line after 30 min on a pow day? Bullshit, Fresh lines can be had all day, and the next, and the next at coronet & remarks, just gotta know where to go.

And no the hills aren't the cheapest, but when you have top notch lifts, one of the most sophisticated snowmaking systems in the world (and this DOES matter - canterbury '05 was a disaster), the best parks and pipes  in the southern hemisphere, heaps of keen and friendly crew to hit the hill with, big comps to enter/watch I'd say it's money well spent.

I'm not dissing the club fields, they are rad as, but writing off the southern lakes is stupid.

Christchurch is probably one of the dullest cities around though.

Picking a uni should really come down to what you wanna study, tbh.

Dunedin is the second driest of NZ's cities, and doesn't get as cold as Christchurch or Invercargill.

Much much much more interesting place to live than Christchurch though, fuck other than Sumner/Taylors chch is a feckin boring shithole as far as cities go.

Also some pretty reasonable wakeboarding spots close by

Work is hardly (shouldn't be) a priority while you are studying eh, that's a real shit way to be. 

Yea you get some good gigs, Iron Maiden was epic. But the local music scene is pretty dull, and I hear that from muso's up that way, bugger all in the way of decent venues for local bands, Al's is alright, Dux is good but has noise restrictions, and the jetset is gone. Other than that, ChCh nightlife is just punter/bogan/boyracer central. No thanks.

Dunedin has a buttload of hiking spots also, yea our hills are further away, but its pretty easy to fit in trips while you're at uni. Onsnow accom at an NZ hill for $10/night? Yes please!