Finally in New Zealand rather than Scotland!

Oor car - dents & all (shame the smell of the boot cant travel though!)
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As per previous entries my flickr address for the full photos & videos is http://www.flickr.com/photos/tanyaconnor/collections/72157609516772066/

Saturday 7th December

The drive down from Nelson to Franz Joseph Glacier only took 6 hours, with not many people out on the roads. I drove the first 4ish hours whilst Jackie had the occasional snooze at the side of me. We swapped over driving at Greymouth, but to be honest I was right up for taking the steering wheel back when Jackie went to start the car by putting the key in her ear???!!! Needless to say we got here safe & sound! Drive down was lovely & its nice to get into countryside which looks different from Scotland! The Franz Joseph Glacier stretches right down almost to road level & is certainly the lowest level glacier I've ever seen. Hopefully we will get a chance to do a half day Glacier hike where they crampon you up & get to walk on the ice.

The view from the village most of the time we were there!
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Sunday 8^th December

Managed to catch up on a few Skype calls – good to see you are all looking well. Boyley called just before 2am my time (was updating the blog) & I got to see my bairn for the first time in 3 weeks. Needless to say she totally ignored my voice, but then again she could be more the slightly miffed at the fact that her guardian for the next 4 months has had her dressed up in a Santa suit for cats?!

Got to bed at 3am & had a nice long lie in til after 11am. Weather today is appalling so to be honest we are right back to Scotland again as you can only see rain & no mountains let alone glaciers! We weren't going to be doing much today anyway so actually if its going to rain at all it might as well be today. Popped out for a nice bit of lunch in the local coffee shop. Bit of portion control required on the chips though as we ordered 2 small portions & ended up with 2 baskets of chips – god knows what the large size would have been like! So back at the computer just now trying to upload the photos & finally get some of them on the blog. Not sure if we are going to do the glacier walk now as apparently the weather has been bad & this has eroded away bits of the path so that time spent on the ice has been reduced & there doesn't seem to be the opportunity to get into the ice caves. Jackie wouldn't be able to do it anyway as it does involve 30 minutes of walking up & then down steep ice steps which would knacker her knee. So thinking perhaps that the $95 could go towards say a heli trip up to a Glacier down at Queenstown.

Hooray - mountain view at last (5 minutes before we leave?!)
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Tuesday 9^th December

Took a drive down to the access car park for Franz Josef Glacier. Yellow danger tape everywhere warning you not to go any further due to excess rain & flooding/landslides etc. After seeing many people jump the tape & return undead I decided too to jump the tape; sensible Jackie stayed with the bags! Really Don't know what the fuss was about I've encountered more dangerous pavements on Great Western Road! Had a nice amble over the rocks which resembled the hidden valley at Glencoe and got me pretty close to the Glacier. Its amazing how far down the mountain the glacier is & also how close this is to sea level. Returned unscathed to Jackie who had been pulling her teeth at local Kiwis complaining about their husbands & proclaiming they were going to be carb free from this Friday; the kiwi housewives life obviously rocks!!

Franz Josef Glacier (look how wee the man is in the foreground!)
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Drove on down to Fox glacier hoping that it might have reopened, unfortunately the subtle signs on the access path told us otherwise! Thought we might be able to at least view the glacier but no that was also closed. Actually surprised we made it to the glacier viewing point road as going through Fox Glacier town Jackie decided to drive through foot deep potholes at 70kmh; my ipod attempted a bungy from its holder, the steering wheel was all over the place & I'm surprised the actual back wheel stayed on! Other car issues today is that our big water has leaked in the boot to totally magnify the already boak smell of dead body in there. This smell has now gotten into the car & really makes you want to wrench – not good. Bicarb of soda & febreeze extra seem to be doing to trick at the moment, but the test will be when the boot is opened at Queenstown – please let the dead body smell be gone!!!

Is the road really closed?!
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Had an amusing moment when we passed over a bridge called Harey Marey which we both interpreted as Hairy Mary – I'm sure Stevie would find that amusing as well! Which actually reminds me now of back in Rotorua where Jackie was singing “arrive-alive-oh” to the “arrive alive” road signs – its just one big comic show over here I tell you!!

Wednesday 10^th December

Typing this (or trying to in the car whilst Jackie drives!) Had dinner last night in the Landing – very pleasant Fajitas, however dinner to late, excess garlic & going straight to bed = feeling sick all night & me/Jack rendezvousing in the lounge until 4am with peppermint tea! Landing a nice bar but in contrast to the night before in Monsoon where we were surrounded by fit young things, we were surrounded by dense kiwi 30-40something type males. Within 2 minutes of sitting down – dense male number 1 had latched on to Jackie writing in her book & asked if she was writing out a shopping list. Several minutes of trying later he then asked if we wanted to accompany him to a hot pool the next day for a few hours – complete with Champagne (although I reckon that would end up being NZ equivalent of Asti Spumante!). Language was choice coming from the various tables – find it very amusing to listen to the Kiwis swearing & boy can the blokes swear! The table behind us also started onto that well known IQ deficient type conversation topic of ”queers” (or as Jackie just put as “males with unresolved sexuality issues!) Struth – quite scary listening to the homophobic crap – I'm guessing that southern kiwi male types are a bit Neanderthal – I'd fit in just fine!!!

Hairy Mary Creek!
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Also before I forget we passed a watering hole in a small town called the Puke Pub – fantastic! - although the e has an accent on it so I'm guessing its pukae but still!

Carnage on he road today has been high – deid possums everywhere & those beasts are pretty big as well.