Today must begin with an attempt to see the famous reflection of Aoraki Mt Cook in Lake Matheson and with a photo of Fox Glacier.
A glacier! Hundreds of years worth of ice and snow, compacted into a morphing ice cube.
I decided to start with the Lake Matheson/Aoraki Mt Cook view, because ‘the jetty is just a short walk from the carpark’ <friendly smile>.
Lake Matheson was a delight, as you could see. I had a good time. But it’s not called Fox Glacier township for Lake Matheson now, is it?
Just glacial things
I’ll just cut straight to it. I saw Fox Glacier from the lookout. I lost my stuff. Why? I don’t rightly know.
Because it is a big block of ice that’s persisting through all this decidedly non-freezing weather. Because there could be so many fascinating things buried inside it. Because it doesn’t just sit still, but rather expands, cracks and moves under its own weight.
It was just beautiful.
All of that took me over two hours to explore, starting barely 5 minutes away from Fox Glacier township.
I made my way out of town and headed for Franz Josef.
Short story shorter, I made my way up a side road marked by a smallish sign that read ‘Franz Josef Access’ in standard font, as if it’s unimportant. Access? A glacier? I’d have put it in neon and hired a person to don a puffy glacier mascot suit and spin a ‘hOnk iF yoU likE Ice’ sign.
I stopped briefly in Greymouth on the way to Punakaiki.
Boy, do the pancake rocks at Punakaiki deserve their own page… 😉