So we arrived at the Fox Glacier first and it was raking it down, from the view point we couldn't even see the tip of the glacier. When getting up to the Glacier itself it was still pretty hard to see anything due to the torrential rain and fog.
So we drove on to the Franz Josef Glacier - the more commercialized of NZ's glaciers. Unfortunately it was still pouring with rain - a shame because we had had nothing but sun since we arrived. We booked a glacier hike for the morning hoping the weather would clear up...
Luckily it did - the half day hike took us up onto the glacier itself, hiking the massive ancient ice formation with boots with spikes on - real mountain people :-). We navigated through a windy pathway that was obviously carved out for hikers - but also got to hike through an ice cave which was so blue inside. The pictures will follow shortly. Some of the other formations like internal rivers and huge triangular rock faces were very cool to look at up close. It's a really erie feeling standing on a huge flow of ice, that is moving everyday. The sun even came out and said hello at the summit of the glacier, hundreds of metres above where we were, but it was great for the camera side of things. The hike itself is not that strenous - Dave wanted to go higher on the full day, but we definately chose the right one as it again clouded over and tipped it down in the afternoon. Our guide Jess was also pretty good being both knowledegable and fun at the same time.
With Franz Josef ticked off the list, we were now working our way up the West Coast - which by the way is very scenic with mountains to one side, rivers and the sea on the other. Next stop was Nelson for Able Tasman National Park - something neither of us has done before - but its a good 6-7 hour drive so we are taking it easy, doing it in a couple of days.