It's just a big ice cube really

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We reached Te Anua with just enough petrol left. We stopped here just to have a coffee before heading back up to Queenstown. We passed straight through Queenstown and finally stopped in Wanaka. It was not going to be possible to do the whole journey in one day so we stopped here for the rest of the day and evening. As we had already explored Wanaka so we just had a lazy afternoon and evening involving ice cream and then boring stuff like laundry.

We did manage to bump into an annoying man from Australia in our Dorm. He was in bed when we came in at about 11pm so we were so quiet but in the morning at 7am he was re-packing his entire bag into the noisiest plastic bag he could find, and despite there being plenty of light in the room he had to open the curtains to let the sun in.
As we were now awake we got quite an early start on our way up the West Coast.

Our first stop was Haast. It’s a tiny little coastal town with nothing happening apart from a massive beach stretching for as far as you can see in both directions. Littering the beach were thousands of pieces of driftwood most the size of fully-grown trees. It looked quite eerie. We continued up the coast to Fox Glacier. By now the weather had clouded up and it looked like it was going to rain. We took a walk to the foot of the glacier and to be honest it didn’t look that spectacular. On its way down the mountains it brings with it loads of rock and debris so most of the ice is covered in crap. To see the true glacier you need to take a helicopter to the top were you could go on a guided walk over the glacier and into ice caves. This sounded like a really good idea but as the clouds were getting thicker no helicopters were going to be taking off.
We decided instead to head to Matheson Lake. If you ever see a postcard of this place it is always taken from here because the lake beautifully mirrors Mount Cook in its waters. Well its does on a clear day. We couldn’t even see the mountains let alone a reflection. It was still a nice walk though. After the lake we headed to Gillespies Beach. It’s down a 21km winding gravel track. It also crosses several large hills so you are not only having to swing the car from side to side but you are also either going up or down. Finally we got to a little clearing and parked the car. After taking a wrong turning we ended up walking through gorse for about 10 minutes before finally being able to get onto the beach. It was yet another beach that stretched for as far as you could see in both directions. While we sat there watching the sun go down over the ocean three dolphins came to play in front of us. They would take it in turns to swim and jump in sequence. It was worth the long drive just to watch them.

That night in the hostel we went to see the glowworms. Thousands of tiny blue lights the size of an LED lighting up the corner of a wood.

The next morning we woke to rain. A little disheartened we headed of to the Franz Josef Glacier. By the time we got there the rain had stopped. By the time we had walked to the foot of the glacier the clouds were building again. This glacier looked pretty much like the last, a large lump of ice covered in rock. With the weather closing in we decided not to stay any longer and continued on our way.

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