Franz Josef Glacier, West Coast

Sunset

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The bus took about 3 hours from Wanaka. We opted to stay at Rainforest Retreat, which when we got there was a bad idea due to the big Kiwi Experience coaches parked outside. The room was ok if it wasn't for the crazy sleep talking girl in our room, it was constant- so didn't get a very good night's sleep the first night. She also said that she sleepwalked and said that in the previous hostel she slepwalked in the night and knocked to get back in, but they wouldn't let her in. I am bloody not surprised! We secretly wished she slepwalked on the second night because I am sure we would have done the same! The only thing with this place was the mess the kiwi experience group left, in the kitchen etc- most of them still live at home, so prob not used to clearing up after themselves!

The following day we booked to go on a half day hike to the glacier. The trek was to start at 8.45 so we had an early start. First of all we had to get kitted out with the boots, gore-tex jacket, gloves, ice talonz (metal brackets for your shoes- they keep you from falling on the ice), socks and hat. Then we got a bus to the car park where we started the trek. Overall it was really good, the trek itself was harder than I thought in some parts but was pleased that I didn't fall over- I was sooo careful. When you are wearing the ice-talonz on yout shoes you have to stamp your feet on the ice to make sure they grip, which is a bit different to normally tiptoeing on the ice like usual, so had to get used to that. We also saw some blue ice, which I didn't think we would see so we were quite impressed with that. So definately got some nice photos.

Bev with Axe on glacier

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On the way to Kaikoura we stopped at Hanmer Springs which was reeeallly nice because the water was so hot and it was cold outside. The only thing was we had to run from the changing rooms in our swimming stuff, I wore my flipflops but Jamie forgot his. When we got in our feet were freezing! It was so nice though- we hadn't had a warm bath for so long was nice to have a soak- without the bubble bath of course. The last one we went in was 40 degrees, couldn't stay in there for too long because we started to overheat.

The roads in New Zealand are so easy to drive around (not that I did any driving but I watched!), there is usually only one road from place to place which makes it so simple to navigate, which is good for me. New Zealand has such a tiny population (4 Million people) they don't really need motorways. Most of the time they have one lane bridges and we were so surprised to see one with 2 lanes.