What a horrible day – weatherwise that is. We woke to the sound of rain thundering on the roof and, apart from the odd period of dry, it’s been like it all day.
We left the hotel after a very pleasant breakfast and decided not to bother driving to the beach, so followed the SH6 north towards Fox Glacier. All we could see of the land around us was mist and, as we climbed higher into the mountains, low cloud and driving rain.
We stopped for a quick photo from Knights Point Lookout about 32km north of Haast (very cold) and again at Bruce Bay (41km further on) as the sea was coming in so hard, it was setting up huge amounts of spray and looked quite pretty. The flies were out again in force and Tom had left the car door open while he was filming, so I spent the next half hour or so, killing the ruddy things. They’re smaller than mozzies but bigger than midges and nip like mad. Even I have had a few bites and Tom now has 8 lumps looking red and angry. We think the flies consider the repellent we’ve been putting on as some sort of tasty dressing.
Roadworks on the SH6 between Bruce Bay and Fox Glacier were up to the standard we’ve learnt to expect – not a lot of warning and only rough gravel and stones for (in this case) several kilometres.
Once we arrived at the access road to Fox Glacier. There are two roads marked on the map, and when we came to the first, it was called Glacier View Road. There’s a clue we thought, so drove up it for 2k, to a tiny turning area, with a distant view of the glacier through a gap in the trees. That was it!! On the basis that if this one wasn’t good, the other couldn’t be much worse, we drove down the first track, back to the main road. At this point, as if it wasn’t raining enough, the heavens opened, so we decided to miss out the second track and head on a couple of kilometres to Fox Glacier Township, where we stopped for the statutory coffee and cake, while we figured out Plan B. Thank goodness for the waterproofs we’d bought in Queenstown, but even they didn’t keep us completely dry between the car and the café. “Oh this is quite normal”, said the waitress, “in fact, it’s very welcome as it’s been so dry”!!
After we had sat and thunk for a while, the rain eased, so we decided to go back and try the other track. We must have done something right as this gave a much better view, and as a bonus, the rain actually cleared for long enough to walk 5 minutes each way to the official viewpoint to take photos,
then started to pour again as soon as we got back to the car. On to Franz Josef Glacier next, 25km further on. And still it poured but never mind, we’re hardy, intrepid travellers (ha, ha!) so we drove to the viewpoint carpark. Miracle of miracles – it stopped raining and it was quite warm, and there were NO flies, so we got into our waterproofs – just in case – and set off on the 20 minute walk (each way) on the Sentinel Rock Walk (track climbs steadily to spectacular glacier views – so it says on the information board). They weren’t wrong and the views of Franz Josef were worth the effort.
It looks quite impressive, a bit like the airship hangars at Cardington do – large and quite close, but no, it’s actually immense, and quite far away. It’s so big that your brain cannot believe the size, because there is nothing to give you any sense of scale, so you simply reduce it, mentally, to something you can believe. When Tom adds the pictures, he’ll do a bit of editing to show you just how big the glacier is. Tom's Bit. If you look at the bottom of the glacier, you will see a cave. I've enlarged this in th picture below. In the next picture, I've enlarged the bottom right of the glacier the same amount. This one has people in it.
If we’d had more time, we could have been persuaded to walk to it, about an hour and a half’s return trip, but I’m glad we didn’t, as no sooner had we set off again in the car, the rain started in earnest – full speed wipers and 60-70kph all the way to Harihari, where we’re in a cabin for the night. Again there’s no net access here although Tom was able to do Fridays blog at the Craft shop across the road. It was another old style PC with no USB ports, so he had to copy out all that I’d typed and by the time he’d done Friday, the owner was ready to close. There’s no mobile coverage in the cabin either, so we had to drive 1km down the road to make contact with Al and Jenn.
We haven’t booked ahead for Westport where we hope to stay tomorrow – partly because of the lack of mobile network, but we reckon (all right I reckon) that it’s so quiet, we should have no trouble finding a motel – watch this space!!
Early night tonight – there’s nothing else to do here – so we’ll “speak” to you tomorrow.
We left the hotel after a very pleasant breakfast and decided not to bother driving to the beach, so followed the SH6 north towards Fox Glacier. All we could see of the land around us was mist and, as we climbed higher into the mountains, low cloud and driving rain.
We stopped for a quick photo from Knights Point Lookout about 32km north of Haast (very cold) and again at Bruce Bay (41km further on) as the sea was coming in so hard, it was setting up huge amounts of spray and looked quite pretty. The flies were out again in force and Tom had left the car door open while he was filming, so I spent the next half hour or so, killing the ruddy things. They’re smaller than mozzies but bigger than midges and nip like mad. Even I have had a few bites and Tom now has 8 lumps looking red and angry. We think the flies consider the repellent we’ve been putting on as some sort of tasty dressing.Roadworks on the SH6 between Bruce Bay and Fox Glacier were up to the standard we’ve learnt to expect – not a lot of warning and only rough gravel and stones for (in this case) several kilometres.
Once we arrived at the access road to Fox Glacier. There are two roads marked on the map, and when we came to the first, it was called Glacier View Road. There’s a clue we thought, so drove up it for 2k, to a tiny turning area, with a distant view of the glacier through a gap in the trees. That was it!! On the basis that if this one wasn’t good, the other couldn’t be much worse, we drove down the first track, back to the main road. At this point, as if it wasn’t raining enough, the heavens opened, so we decided to miss out the second track and head on a couple of kilometres to Fox Glacier Township, where we stopped for the statutory coffee and cake, while we figured out Plan B. Thank goodness for the waterproofs we’d bought in Queenstown, but even they didn’t keep us completely dry between the car and the café. “Oh this is quite normal”, said the waitress, “in fact, it’s very welcome as it’s been so dry”!!After we had sat and thunk for a while, the rain eased, so we decided to go back and try the other track. We must have done something right as this gave a much better view, and as a bonus, the rain actually cleared for long enough to walk 5 minutes each way to the official viewpoint to take photos,
then started to pour again as soon as we got back to the car. On to Franz Josef Glacier next, 25km further on. And still it poured but never mind, we’re hardy, intrepid travellers (ha, ha!) so we drove to the viewpoint carpark. Miracle of miracles – it stopped raining and it was quite warm, and there were NO flies, so we got into our waterproofs – just in case – and set off on the 20 minute walk (each way) on the Sentinel Rock Walk (track climbs steadily to spectacular glacier views – so it says on the information board). They weren’t wrong and the views of Franz Josef were worth the effort. It looks quite impressive, a bit like the airship hangars at Cardington do – large and quite close, but no, it’s actually immense, and quite far away. It’s so big that your brain cannot believe the size, because there is nothing to give you any sense of scale, so you simply reduce it, mentally, to something you can believe. When Tom adds the pictures, he’ll do a bit of editing to show you just how big the glacier is. Tom's Bit. If you look at the bottom of the glacier, you will see a cave. I've enlarged this in th picture below. In the next picture, I've enlarged the bottom right of the glacier the same amount. This one has people in it.If we’d had more time, we could have been persuaded to walk to it, about an hour and a half’s return trip, but I’m glad we didn’t, as no sooner had we set off again in the car, the rain started in earnest – full speed wipers and 60-70kph all the way to Harihari, where we’re in a cabin for the night. Again there’s no net access here although Tom was able to do Fridays blog at the Craft shop across the road. It was another old style PC with no USB ports, so he had to copy out all that I’d typed and by the time he’d done Friday, the owner was ready to close. There’s no mobile coverage in the cabin either, so we had to drive 1km down the road to make contact with Al and Jenn.We haven’t booked ahead for Westport where we hope to stay tomorrow – partly because of the lack of mobile network, but we reckon (all right I reckon) that it’s so quiet, we should have no trouble finding a motel – watch this space!!
Early night tonight – there’s nothing else to do here – so we’ll “speak” to you tomorrow.
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