New Zealand - South Island - Franz Josef

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Hi everyone, just come back from walking to the Franz Josef Glacier. It was an hour and a half to two hours return so it was fine, didn't have to take any ropes or pickaxe's !! Stu and I dressed up for the occasion, well it was going to be freezing right by a Glacier ! Crikey, by the time we came down we were sweating buckets !! I had gloves, scarf and a 3rd fleece in my back pack, I have no idea what we were thinking, were we going to stand on it ? We were 250 metres away from it, Stu said this was dangerous as we could hear rocks constantly falling down around us! but it wasn't, otherwise we wouldn't be allowed anywhere near it! even though the weather could change very quickly. We read that bits of the glacier break off regularly, up to he size of a camper van. I will put picture on of what it looked like in 2008 and 2012 (number 3), it is retreating, even though it's been there since the ice - age. When we got as far to the Glacier as we could it was pretty spectacular, infact all the mountains and waterfalls along the way were amazing. We came through rainforest on the way in and again the scenery was breathtaking. We have now come back to the hostel, having lunch and then off to the Glacier Hot Springs as it raining buckets here !! But it's not cold.

Hi, back again from the Hot Springs, lovely soak, they had 3 pools outside in a rainforest surrounded by Kamahi and Matai trees. The pools were at different temperatures, one at 36, one at 38 and the other one at 40 degrees which was hot. My skin feels really good, I kept putting the pure glacier water on my face and when I came out I didn't need any moisturer. They do use a filter cleaning system in the water every hour. Lovely place, really relaxing. Stu said it would be better if they sold Beer !!

So, all afternoon Stu kept saying we've got to get back to the hostel to get our free soup and bread. It was like his mission for the day, yes the soup was nice and it was free but I could live without it !! So at 6.00 pm (soup time), we arrived back at the hostel to find a queque, free pizza, bread and pasties were going. Stu was straight in there, nicking the pizza, it was just a free for all !! There was even a couple of oldies like us there, one chap was lining up politely and a japanese girl took the last bit of pizza, she took one look at the oldie and gave it to him, how nice is that. It is a lovely hostel, really friendly and the owners are very generous, even at lunchtime the owner's son made big bowls of free popcorn for people. You know, we are in no hurry to leave here, we have fitted in very nicely.

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