When you’re deciding where to build, it’s worth thinking about the everyday too: where you’ll grab a coffee, where you’ll take the family for lunch on a Sunday, and where you’ll go when there’s something to celebrate.
At Homestead Bay, the answers start just down the road and stretch out to some of Central Otago’s best-known vineyards. Here’s our guide to eating and drinking near home, from your morning coffee to a long weekend lunch.
On your doorstep
The Farmhouse, Hanley’s Farm
The neighbourhood’s own cafe, bar and restaurant sits on Jack Hanley Drive in neighbouring Hanley’s Farm. It opened in late 2023, run by the team behind The Exchange in Queenstown, and it was built to be somewhere you can drop into any day of the week, not just for special occasions.
The coffee is locally roasted, the menu runs from breakfast to dinner on most days, and there’s a small shelf of household essentials for when you’ve run out of milk. It’s where Saturday morning catch-ups happen and where the kids talk you into an ice cream on the walk home. It’s also conveniently located opposite a park, so the kids can play while you enjoy your coffee hot.
Fifteen minutes away: Frankton
Frankton is around 15 minutes from Homestead Bay, and it’s where most everyday eating out happens.
The Boat Shed, Frankton Marina
A local favourite for weekend brunch. It’s housed in the old New Zealand Railways Shipping Office, a building dating from the 1870s that was moved to the Frankton waterfront in 1936 and restored by local volunteers in 2011. Today it serves breakfast and lunch right on the water, with a deck that makes a grey morning feel like an occasion.
It sits on the Frankton Track, so it works just as well as a stop on a lakeside walk or bike ride as it does as a destination.
Remarkables Park and Five Mile
For the weeknight dinner, the post-sport feed and the takeaway when nobody wants to cook, Frankton’s shopping precincts cover a lot of ground. Japanese, Mexican, Indian, wood-fired pizza and a couple of proper pubs are all within a few minutes of each other, which makes the “what does everyone want” conversation much shorter.
Wet Jacket Wines, Queenstown Marina
You don’t have to go far for a wine tasting. Wet Jacket runs a cellar door in a shed at the Queenstown Marina in Frankton, close enough to call in on the way home.
Saturdays: the Remarkables Market
From spring through to autumn, Saturday mornings have a fixed point. The Remarkables Market sets up at the Red Barn in Remarkables Park, Frankton, with around 60 stalls of local produce, baking, cheese, coffee and crafts.
There’s live music, picnic tables, a sandpit and playground for the kids, and The Remarkables as the backdrop. Come early for the best produce, stay for a market lunch, and pick up whatever’s in season. In summer, that means Central Otago cherries and apricots.
The market has been running since 2010 and is working towards being New Zealand’s first zero-waste market, with a mug library for anyone who forgets their cup. It also runs a handful of special winter markets, so check the dates before you go.
Wine country, half an hour away
One of the quiet luxuries of living at Homestead Bay is that Central Otago’s wine country is an easy weekend drive.
Gibbston: the Valley of the Vines
Gibbston is Queenstown’s closest wine-growing area, set along the Kawarau River gorge and roughly half an hour’s drive from Homestead Bay. A few of the cellar doors worth getting to know:
- Gibbston Valley Winery: the region’s pioneer, with its first commercial vintage in 1987. It has a restaurant, cellar door, cheesery and New Zealand’s largest wine cave.
- Kinross: one cellar door pouring wines from several small Gibbston producers too small to run their own, with a bistro and wine garden.
- Peregrine: worth the stop for the architecture alone; the cellar door is shaped like a falcon’s wing.
- Chard Farm: reached by a scenic private road above the Kawarau River.
The Gibbston River Trail links several of them along the river, so a bike and a designated driver for the way home make a very good Sunday.
Amisfield, Lake Hayes
For a special occasion, Amisfield at Lake Hayes is around 25 minutes away. Its wines come from a certified organic vineyard, and it runs two experiences: a relaxed a la carte bistro by day, and an award-winning tasting menu by night. Book ahead for the evening.
A week of eating, Homestead Bay style
Put it together and a normal week looks something like this: morning coffee at The Farmhouse, a weeknight takeaway from Frankton, the market on Saturday morning and, every so often, a long lunch among the vines.
None of it needs a big trip into town. It’s all part of everyday life at Homestead Bay.