Mount Cook

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We camped inside the Mount Cook National Park grounds, before doing a day of hiking towards the famous Mountain itself in the Hooker Valley. As we are not trained mountaineers we were not allowed to pick our way up the side of the mountain itself, but we did manage to complete a hike right through the national park, across the glacier valley, over swingbridges and then up to the foot of the mountain.
As we were both taking pictures of lumps of ice that had broken off the Hooker Glacier and were slowly being washed down the river as they melted I noticed Thom was chatting to a rather dishevelled fella. As it turned out, he was an avid mountaineer who had decided to take the straightest route from Fox Glacier to the Hooker Glacier by climbing over the top of the glaciers and then the mountains on his own. We took the normal route and went from one glacier to the other by road which if you go the shortest way is about 400kilometers. He had been walking for three days and had climbed for a distance of about 12 kilometers. He told us it was tough walking, and that he had fallen and cut his arm, and that it was really scary on one of the nights where he had to stay inside his bivvy bag with the wind howling through the rest hut. When we got back to the van after finishing our hike Thom rightfully took him a fresh cold beer out of our eskie to help him celebrate his return.
We had a leisurley drink in the Hermatige Hotel which overlooks the Mount, and then we made our way on to the next stop - Lake Tekapo.


Lake Tekapo was a bit too touristy for us. It's suposed to be a placid lake where a little church (The Church of The Good Shephard) sits by the side of it. When there are coach loads of people running towards this church to get their snaps and pushing and shoving past each other to get a promised slice of tranquility, the whole point of it is kind of spoilt. Needless to say, we didn't hang around for very long. Thom braved the masses and got some photo's which create the illusion of tranquility.

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Photos

Getting Arty
People gathered around and laughed at us hovering over this piece of ice with the stick.
But ho ho ho, who had the last laugh?

Mount Cook National Park
The view looking back down the valley from Mount Cook

.....Round the corner a bit more
Mount Cook

Flutterby
These were all over the shop at the national park. Weird to think it's a rare thing to see a tortoise shell butterfly in the UK

Would you pay to canoe on this?
naaaaah, neither would we!

A Mountaineers Hut
Mount Cook, New Zealand

Cook's Tip
"Never overuse anchovies".
Mount Cook

Hooker Valley Moraine Lake
Mount Cook

Swingin'
Mount Cook

Glacial Waters
Mount Cook

A Grand Finale
Just what you need after a day out hiking in the hills.

Hoi Sin Ninja
These Ducks hung around the van the entire night and were waiting for us to wake up the next morning.... Why Thom got martial arts with them, I have no idea!