Franz Josef..... is a glacier of course :-P

When you have to cook for yourself, this isn't a bad view to have...

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Phew, this is beginning to feel like a whistle stop tour of the South Island of New Zealand!

All I know is that I want to come back and revisit so many of the places I have already seen, it's an amazing place that has really captured my spirit/imagination - meh, it's hard to describe, I think you have to come here to feel it, or not depending on what you like from holidays :-P

The trip over from Wanaka involved a number of steep mountain passes, which isn't uncommon for the South Island, but as I was going down a particularly steep section, it had a sign saying "run away cars, run off zone in 1km", now luckily, I wasn't in a run away car, but I figured, if I was, that sign would be a welcome image.

The down side, is that to just round a gentle corner from that sign, before you hit the run off zone, you need to get round two 90 degree turns, where the recommended speed limit is 45 km (just less than 30 mph) before you get to the emergency run off zone.

The Glacier and the river running from it (take from the helicopter)

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Not sure, but to me, the idea of controlling a run away car around that bend... well I just think that the first sign would give me false hope, but luckily it wasn't anything I needed!

So, back to Franz Josef, technically, this is another Glacier, although this doesn't have a lake at the bottom of it  like the Tasman Glacier I saw before and on that Glacier I only saw the terminal face (the end of it). 

I had planned to walk up the Glacier on a full day hike, but after looking at the result of my tumble in Wanaka the idea of 8 hours in a full ankle boot (they provide waterproof climbing boots if you don't have them) didn't seem like a good idea, that and it was still a little swollen, so I changed my trip to a heli hike  - a mere 3 hours in an ice boot and only 2 hours walking on the Glacier.

Entering an ice cave

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However, The night before the hike, I think I put my foot into it a little, no pun intended, we were sat in the common room discussing what are plans were for the following day and I said "well I was due to go on the full day hike, but I am not sure that is a good idea after my fall, so I changed to the lazy option, the 3 hour heli hike".

Well I was being honest, then the chap sat to my right said "I'm on that hike, I wouldn't say at least 2 hours hiking was being lazy" - oops... I don't think he was impressed, but everyone else laughed!

What can I say about the hike, it was amazing going through Ice caves, that the guide dug his way into, we only were able to get all the way through 1 the other 2 we went into but had to climb back out the way we had entered as there was no viable exit.

Inside an ice cave, now I can see why they call glacier ice, blue ice...

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Once inside the caves, you can see why they call Glacier ice blue ice, inside the caves, where the air hasn't had a chance to whiten the walls they literally glow a fantastic blue colour, with that, the shapes that form inside these pressure caves and the smooth feel of the ice cave, it's almost easy to forget that there are a significant number of tonnes of ice above you.

In addition, the ice flow we were on is one of the fastest moving glaciers, moving at approximately 1 meter a day on the upper section we were on; so the ice caves are ever changing, new ones appearing, old collapsing, it gives you a real feel of the power of nature when you see how it has forced the ice apart into large pressure caves.

Its hard not to come away from a trip like that without a respect for the power and beauty of the natural things around us, these are not man made or in any way controlled by man, we are merely able to catch a glimpse of what nature produces without a manmade influence - except maybe for the entry/exit points of course....

Although this isn't a hike for those that aren't happy in enclosed spaces, since you are, at times, crouching down to get through the caves, with just enough space to climb out at the other end.

I have an unflattering picture of the man in front of me, only just getting through the exit - I didn't post that one onto the site, as although you can't identify him - well I wouldn't want it to be a picture of me!

The only recognisable person in the pictures, is a fellow climber, Angela, who decided to do the superman pose and hold up a few tonnes of Ice!

Since I am on the subject of pictures, you will all be glad to hear, that to cut down on pc time, I am no longer uploading all my pictures, just a small selection of the ones  I took, uploading them just takes too much of my time.... and I didn't go travelling to sit in front of a PC all day.

Still, to top it off my amazing display of tact,  I was playing pool that evening with a Japanese lad who was as bad at it as me (and that's saying something!) when the person I had hiked with from the hostel (the one I made the lazy comment before I knew he was going...) asked me to provide a second opinion.

Another hiker was on a day hike and had "tweaked" a leg muscle and I was asked how energetic the heli hike had been, so I told the truth

"Well, it wasn't a hard hike, not very vigourous and a fair bit of standing while they cut the path out, although you are going over permanently undulating terrain which is sometimes a litle rough, but a hike I think anyone could do"

Next time, I should stop and think, the guy who had also hiked it said (almost defensively) "well I didn't think it was a walk in the park, I'd call it moderate ability" oops, I really should engage tactful mode first....

But anyway, apart from the boot doing not so nice things to the graze, it was a fantastic day out in almost perfect weather.. pictures found here.