Glaciers!

We stopped at Kahurangi Estate winery on our way out of the Nelson region. Neudorf was better, but we had some good wines and picked up a very interesting Sauv Blanc with fun grassy, asparagus flavors. We drove some more, making a bit of a wrong turn in the mountains and ending up along a valley instead of the coast. Oops. We'll hit the coast road on our way north. We stopped in Greymouth to check out the holiday parks, but prices there were high, so we moved a bit down the road to Hokitika and got a nice $25 spot for the night.

The next day we made the much shorter drive down to the glaciers. Franz Josef and Fox Glaciers are only about 30 km apart along the west side of the Southern Alps. They are unusual in that they come so close to the ocean at such a latitude. We stopped in the town of Franz Josef, but again the prices were high so we moved down the road to less-glitzy Fox Glacier. For some reason, in this town tent sites were rare and quite expensive but actual rooms at the holiday park were plentiful and cheap. We took the opportunity to get ourselves a place to stay with walls and a bed, a first since leaving Auckland. The timing worked out well for us too, since Hilary was nursing a small blister from our ridiculously long Abel Tasman walk and, it being the west coast, it was raining steadily.

The next day, it was misty, foggy, and occasionally rained. We waited until a little later in the day, when the fog lifted enough to see half the mountains, to drive back to Franz Josef. We took the short 2 km walk to the terminal face of the glacier, with the official viewing conditions being listed as "good". Cool glacier with an awesomely-scoured valley all around it.

The next day it was actually sunny! We packed up our car and drove west toward the beach to reach the Peak Viewpoint, from where you get a nice shot of the Fox Glacier and Mts Tasman and Cook behind it. Then we parked near the glacier and took the short walk to its terminal face. Fox looks a bit different, and the valley around it is a bit steeper and straighter. It's totally weird to walk to a glacier in a short sleeved shirt and sandals and see ferns all around you.

After our visit to the glaciers, we continued down the coast, stopping here and there to check out the ocean views and a swamp just north of Haast sporting some large trees. We took Haast Pass through the mountains and popped out near Lakes Wanaka and Hawea and got a nice secluded spot at the Lake Hawea Holiday Park, right on the lake.