Blue Ice and Driftwood

It rained very heavily overnight in Franz Josef.  After a leisurely breakfast, we drove out to Okarito - a settlement that originally opened for mining but which diminished in size after as it had grown at the beginning of the Otago gold rush.  Nowadays it seems that the tourists are the only thing that keeps it going (and even then it is not buzzing - the general store which used to open two days a week closed in the mid 80's).  We then went back into Franz Josef township as we were booked on a 1230 glacier walk.  This entailed getting kitted out with boots, crampons and a rainjacket - we declined the hat and glove and overtrouser options as the weather had cleared up very nicely.  We were advised to wear 3 or 4 layers of clothing (which we ignored as it was warm and we are English).  Having been coached to the car park at the bottom of the valley, we walked up a track through the rainforest and emerged to get our first view of the glacier and an impression of the scale of it.  It is difficult to convey the scale as, even looking at it first hand, being told that something on the ice is 6 km away does not quite do it.

The first ice fall beyond the glacier face - and, yes, those are another group of walkers coming down the ice

What looks in places like rock is, often, ice that has been covered in rock dust and debris by landslides or rock falls.  The natty footwear of crampons is a must on the glacier - even though the guides helpfully cut steps in the ice with axes to help the tourists.

Pretty cool eh?

The walk takes place on the lower end of the glacier because that is the area where there are the first ice falls and stresses that open crevasses and create 'caves' and holes.  The fresh ice below the surface is blue - something to do with its reflective quality and blue being the first colour we pick up (the same reason that the sky is blue apparently).  We walk down some of the larger crevasses and through a hole.  Most of the holes are created by water running through and under the glacier.  One we walked through went from a metre diameter to the size it is today in 4 days.



In a crevasse



There was also a huge ice cave which had formed in less than 10 days with millions of tons of ice having collapsed from its ceiling - one could hear more ice falling in the cavern (which was quite spooky).

From there, we had a 90 minute drive up to our next stopping point - Hokitika.  As our walk overran, we did not arrive until 7.30 and, as NZ is not quite like England, we were advised to get out quick to get some supper before everywhere shut!  After eating we went down to the beach to view the annual driftwood and sand sculpting exhibition which finished today - there were some odd and some very good pieces of work.  The overall winner was a cow constructed from pieces collected from the beach, replete with udder and horns!

Tomorrow we are on the move again, so we will have a quick look at Hokitika in the morning as it is the biggest town we have been in since Christchurch and has, we are told, a reputation for jade.