Queenstown: Pilot's Choice Helicopter Tour & Alpine Landing

About This Experience

Pilot's Choice is the most-reviewed helicopter flight in Queenstown, and the name is meant literally. Instead of flying one fixed circuit regardless of conditions, your pilot reads the morning's cloud base, wind and snow line and picks the route and the landing site that will look best that day. What you get is twenty-five minutes over Lake Wakatipu and the ranges that wall in the Whakatipu Basin, finishing on a ridge that only a helicopter can reach.

The morning starts at your hotel — pickup and drop-off in central Queenstown are in the price — with a short transfer to the base at the airport. After check-in and the safety briefing you lift off across the basin, and the pilot talks you through the headset: the Remarkables, Cecil and Walter Peaks, the Shotover and Kawarau rivers, the old gold-workings, and the valleys film crews keep coming back to.

The landing is the part guests write about afterwards. You step out several thousand feet above the lake with the rotor idling and get the photograph you came for. In winter there is snow underfoot; in summer the same ridges are bare schist and tussock and the draw is the sightline rather than the snow. Department of Conservation landing and concession fees are already included, so the price you book is the price you pay.

Highlights

• Your pilot picks the route and the landing site to suit the day's conditions
• Alpine landing on a ridge or snowfield reachable only by helicopter
• Twenty-five minutes over Lake Wakatipu, the Remarkables and the Whakatipu Basin
• Hotel pickup and drop-off in central Queenstown included
• Queenstown's most-reviewed helicopter flight, rated 4.9 by 305 guests

What's Included

• ✓ Hotel pickup and drop-off in central Queenstown
• ✓ 25-minute scenic helicopter flight
• ✓ Alpine landing
• ✓ Live in-flight commentary through your headset
• ✓ Department of Conservation landing and concession fees

Not Included

• Food and drinks
• Gratuities

What to Bring

• Warm layers
• Sunglasses
• Camera
• Sunscreen
• Closed-toe shoes

Good to Know & Caveats

• Routes, flight paths and landing sites vary with the weather and are at the pilot's discretion
• The quoted flight time is approximate and includes the time spent on the ground at the landing site
• Flights are weather-dependent — if yours is cancelled you can rebook or take a full refund
• Minimum passenger numbers apply; if a departure does not fill you are offered another slot or a full refund
• Children aged 4 to 14, and anyone over 15 kg, need their own seat; infants under 4 and under 15 kg travel on an adult's lap
• Drones, selfie sticks and tablets are not permitted on board
• Free cancellation up to 24 hours before departure

Meeting Point

Hotel pickup from central Queenstown accommodation. The flight itself departs from The Helicopter Line's base beside Queenstown Airport in Frankton, about ten minutes from town.