A new generation of campers is enjoying Queenstown camping grounds this season, but some late-teenaged campers had to be thrown out for drunken behaviour.
Queenstown Lakes District Council holiday parks manager Greg Hartshorne yesterday said he felt some of the 18- and 19-year-old campers drank a lot more this festive season and the behaviour of some of them was not as good compared to previous years.
"We've noticed this year a lot of young ones who haven't been with us before who still need to be educated to the way we run our park and the rules we have.
"Normally, we get the same ones coming back year after year, but suddenly those ones get to a point when they are not late teens, early 20s any more, they get married and have kids and their habits change.
"What we've got now is a new group of young ones coming through and when you've got as many people as we've got staying here, you have to have a set of rules."
Drinking and the behaviour that goes with drinking required a little more managing over the festive period, Mr Hartshorne said.
"We got rid of a couple ... they had too much to drink and we decided we didn't want them staying with us.
"For every young one we have, we also have an adult or a family. We reopen the old end of the park for the young ones for that period, but the new park is all families and tourists."
Mr Hartshorne said occupancy figures were not yet available, but the Queenstown Lakeview Holiday Park was at capacity over the festive period, with every patch of grass used to help keep campervans off the streets. All 44 rooms had been sold out since December 27, he said.
Arrowtown's Born of Gold Holiday Park was at capacity for five nights over New Year's Eve.
The other two council-managed camping grounds, Wanaka Lakeview Holiday Park and the Glendhu Bay Lakeside Holiday Park, were "well-booked", he said.
Poor weather in Queenstown this week had caused a lot of people to leave early, Mr Hartshorne said.
