Queenstown's gone from being Dick Hubbard's escape-to-bolthole to his home base.
But don't expect the ex-Auckland city mayor to have a go at snatching Queenstown's mayoral chains.
The breakfast cereals magnate and wife Diana have had a holiday home flanking Queenstown Hill in the resort for 15 years and in recent years had found themselves heading south more often than they had expected.
Now the couple have declared: ''We are Queenstowners'', after experiencing a light-bulb moment in December.
''You realise you've got to put a stake in the ground and say somewhere's actually home, and we said, `We are here, and our little apartment in Auckland is an outreach','' Mr Hubbard said.
As much as the ''stunning'' environment was a drawcard, the 68-year-old said it was Queenstown's people that encouraged them to settle there.
''I've seen friends that are older than us and I think they stay young as a result of living down here.''
He would not be chasing the Queenstown mayoral chains.
It would be wrong for someone who had lived most of their life outside to come in and start telling people what to do, he said.
He is not afraid, however, to give his views on local issues, saying, for example, that he supports a bed tax and was, despite founding NZ Businesses for Social Responsibility, concerned at the Resource Management Act stifling development.
The Hubbards had embraced the adventurous spirit of Queenstown, in their case enjoying epic motorcycling trips.
In 2012 they biked the length of the Americas, from north of the Arctic Circle to the bottom of Patagonia - a five-month, 25,000km odyssey through 14 countries ''including those that people tell you not to go to''.
''As far as we know we were the oldest couple in the world to have done it two-up on a motorbike.''
The couple have also ridden around Australia, last year rode around the United States and part of Canada, and are planning a trip to South Africa.
''We say to people we're trying to cram it in before we get to middle age,'' Mr Hubbard said.
Between motorcycling trips, his big mission over the past two years has been project-managing a new home next door to their Queenstown holiday home, which they're only a couple of months from moving into.
Meanwhile, they're settling into a different pace of life in the resort.
''I'm a mountain man through and through, I'm not a natural city person even though I've done my thing in Auckland city,'' Mr Hubbard said.
- Philip Chandler
