Blogs from Glaciers, South Island, New Zealand, Oceania - page 8

our first real day in glacier country. we had high aspirations for the day. we were going to do a semi long hike to get good views of the landmark....but we arrived at the trailhead to find out the trail was closed due to rock instability or something. no go. so we decided to lump together a bunch of shorter walks. it was nice to be out and active for the day with unbelievable scenery. we walked to the face of the glacier. it is monsterous....an incredible sight and something that i cannot possibly explain. a big piece of dirty ice at the bottom and crystal blue at the top. the actual glacier is a daunting mountain of ice cutting its way through the mountains surrounding it. even more daunting though is the path it has ... read more

Having missed out on making in down to Patagonia in 2003, I was dead set on making it up at least some glacier somewhere in the world. Fortunately Franz Josef was a dead cert on our circle of the South Island. Set in the New Zealand Alpine Fault (for the geographers amongst you, its where the Pacific and Australian plates meet in the South Island), the rocks are being squeezed upwards, yet the layers of snow are added to year upon year. It rains pretty much every day and so the glacier is advancing 10 times faster than your average glacier- pretty cool! Incredibly its set in the middle of a rainforest. In the past, Franz Josef (named so because it reminded the explorer who ‘found’ it of the emperor’s beard) had been regarded as ... read more

Arrived in this small glacier focused town, just stopping on the way for a spot of gold panning (no nuggets found alas) just in time for my heli-hike. I thought it was worth blowing the budget and getting right up on top of the glacier to really appreciate the size and magnificence of Franz Joseph, and I wasn’t wrong! I got into the front seat of the helicopter (there are definite pro’s to be light weight!) feeling like a member of the A-team and with my ear protectors in place we took off. The experience of flying in a helicopter was amazing, although flying along you got so close to the rocks it is pretty scary at times! We landed right on to the ice, a real feat of skill for the pilots as everything is ... read more

Finally a break in the rain. And not to sound like spoiled sports but seriously this was supposed to be summer (soltice around the corner and 5 straight days of rain was a little much. And it reains hard as any island country knows. It did stop a few times like on the ferry from the north to south islands. which was nice. you roll right into the Marlborough Sounds which inspired neither of us to start smoking. We then headed straight to Kaikora for whale watching, BUT got rained out. The plus was that we had a fantastic dinner of local mussles and lamb. (Don't tell grandparents). So after that we quickly headed to Christchurch to trade in our rental car for TADAHHHH a sleeper van. Actually it's called a Spaceship simce it's a converted ... read more

27.11.05 Today we drove south to Franz Josef (glacier). On the way we stopped at lake Ianthe where we relaxed in the sun for a short while. We arrived at Franz Josef, had a look around the small, touristy, busy town. (most of the towns we go to are small, like one street) We decided not to book a trip on the glacier for the next day as we were tired and deserved a rest day! We drove to the carpark nearest the glacier and walked to the lookout point, Sentinal rock. From here you could see the glaciers (Franz Josef) terminal face and part of the glacier. From here we were not too impressed with it. It was not what we expected or imagined. We met a girl from Chelmsford! We got booked into a ... read more