Franz Joseph Glacier

26th February

As the crow flies we were only about 50km from Franz Joseph Glacier, but no one's built any roads over Mount Cook, so we have to drive about 600km around the country!!!! The reason for this epic journey (done in one day)......... Glacier Hiking.


There's 9 of us in our hiking group, our guide Jason looks about 17 yrs old, but seems to know what he's doing. We walk along the valley to the "Terminal Face" of the glacier, where we put on our "talons" (crampon like things). Then we climb up around 400m of ice stairs into the cravasses. Our guide cuts ice steps for us with his pick axe along the way. We walk through the cravasses and some ice tunnels - which are beautiful, completely smooth blue ice and dripping. We also squeeze through narrow blue ice gaps, getting very wet in the process. Some of it is quite hard work, especially for those of us with shorter legs! Quite often you don't see the big hole or cravass until after you've stepped over it - scary stuff. A fantastic day and well worth the long drive. Only down side in the return of the sandflies!!!