Blogs from Glaciers, South Island, New Zealand, Oceania - page 4

Thursday - woke up to find the clouds gone and a beautiful snow-capped mountain outside our door. So we went for a walk to see the Franz Josef glacier - we got pretty close to it, but didn't actually walk on it. Close up, glaciers are not pristine and white, but dirty, covered with soil and rocks, and the meltwater that flows out of them is milky grey with silt. Access to the area immediately in front of the glacier is by ladder and appears to be controlled by the companies running the tours. However we ignored the various warnings and during a break in the procession of guided tours ascended the latter and made our way to within 20 yds or so of the glacier itself. Close up it is indeed massive, row upon row ... read more

Phils Day... Today I went Ice Climbing on the Franz Josef Glacier. The day started at 7.45am where we met our 2 glacier guides and 7 more participants (8 including myself). We headed off up the Franz Josef valley in a rickety old van which had a fragant smell of probably hundreds of other peoples sweat. nice. We parked and started walking up the valley until we met the glacier's terminal face, the lowest in the world at 280m above sea level. The glacier itself is dirty with grit and strewn with rocks and boulders; around are huge cliffs and mountains with waterfalls crahing down - and to make things even more spectacular its sunny with just a few clouds. sunshine at last! We fitted out crampons and climbed our way onto the glacier via cut ... read more

And on to the main event. I Was rudely awakened at an hour before 8am, i'm not sure which one, to go on an ICe Climbing trip. During the gear allocation, you start to realise that there might be some proper physical exertion involved. We get given special Ice Boots, lethal looking Ice picks, apparently very painful if used in the wrong manner - Crampons as well as heavy duty climbing ropes being distributed among the group. Our group consisted of the two girls (Niamh/Judith), myself and Martin... a random guy from poland... wearing army pants... who was actually in the army... NATO to be precise and was holidaying before going off to afghanistan. it was looking very unlikely that my male pride would take a backseat and content itself with keeping up with the ... read more

made it from fox glacier in one piece. we couldn't get on the full day hike -- it was, well, full. so we bummed around town for a couple of hours and went out to lake matheson to kill time. we managed to book ourselves for the afternoon half-day hike. thankfully the weather held up and we took in some spectacular views. apparently some of the scenes from "lord of the rings" were shot at both franz josef and fox glaciers. you can tell why they chose those locations. it's quite breathtaking to be up on the ice. aside from some scary heights and cravasses, we had a great time. our guide, pesssang, was a nepalese sherpa that works over here for six months of the year. the rest of the time he works over at ... read more

And so we hit off on our trusty steed (read: battered rental Corolla), following the spectactulour Tranzalpine trail through the Southern Alps from Christchurch to the west coast, through Arthurs Pass. The scenery (chosen as the Misty Mountains for LOTR) was fantastic, and we stopped a couple of times to head off on a "tramp" or walk through the forestry and mountains to waterfalls and scenic viewpoints. Finally arrived in "Glacier Country", home of the Franz Josef and Fox glaciers, and stopped in Franz Josef, a tiny 2-street village probably smaller than Geesala at home! Booked on the full-day hike on Franz Josef (the word's steepest and fastest flowing commercially guided glacer), before taking the car down to the nearby Fox Glacer to do some more tramping in the area round the glacier itself and Lake ... read more