Welcome to the 61st edition of the Queenstown.com Weekly. In this week's edition I present the newest feature on the site being the news sports league featuring the Queenstown Football Club juniors. The Queenstown Gardens and the Wakatipu Environmental Society get a mention too after calls to stop all work in the gardens. There's also the new swimming pool and its unfortunate name change, and finally, I took my New World shopping bill to Fresh Choice and did a comparison. You can find out the results inside this weeks edition.

The thermal underwear has well and truly made it out of the drawer, as the region finally succumbs to the cooler temperatures that herald the winter season. It's been getting cooler for the last 2 months, although some people seem to think that it was still summer yesterday. Weird. This week, QLDC wins it's latest battle with the Mountain Scene, more controversy erupts over new plans for the Queenstown Gardens, Coronet Peak attempts to use efficiency and vehicle reduction to ramp up more business, and Central Otago wineries receive a funding boost to help in developing organic viticulture.

We are currently in the middle of the Autumn 'shoulder' season, and I must admit that I'm enjoying the change of pace before everything goes crazy with the onset of winter. In this edition, I take the time to highlight a few press releases that came in during the last week, ranging from a new clean heating magazine through to the goings on at the Arrowtown Autumn Festival.

Autumn is well and truly upon us. There's a wide variety of golden leaves brilliantly colouring the Wakatipu Basin, and we also got the first real snowfall of the year. In this week's edition, I highlight the mini-media battle that has emerged between the Mountain Scene and the Lakes Weekly Bulletin, who have both recently expanded their operations. Some of us eagerly await this week's Mountain Scene to see if they apologise over their main headline last week, and I announce the zero waste award winners and detail the compost subsidy offered by the QLDC. And lastly, as we head towards $2 a litre petrol, one can only speculate on the affect it will have on local tourism operators and the outlook for Queenstown's future.

After taking last week off to move house and getting some long overdue time off, here is the latest edition of the Queenstown.com weekly. In this edition, we urge everyone to keep an eye out for a missing tourist, Liat Okin of Israel. A photo and description can be found by clicking 'read more'. Also, I issue a correction in regards to some lingering doubts raised about the fundraising efforts made by the WSA in regards to the Queenstown Skate Park. And lastly, approval is given for Queenstown's highest bungy, but will it make it out of the environmental court alive?