Car left in neutral plunges into Lake Wakatipu near Queenstown

A rental car, left in neutral with the handbrake off, has rolled from a Queenstown hotel carpark, across a busy road, and into Lake Wakatipu.

The would be driver, an American tourist, had a soggy start to her holiday after the car took a dip.

Miraculously the car did not hit anything on its way into the lake.

The woman, who asked not to be named, said she was taking luggage into the hotel when the car rolled across Lake Esplanade and into the water.

She had left the car in neutral and forgotten to put the handbrake on, she said.

Nobody was inside the car at the time.

The drama may also come to the small screen, with a crew from Police Ten 7 filming on site.

Police, and curious onlookers, went to the lakefront across the road from the Rydges Hotel shortly before 3pm.