Keith had been looking forward to this weekend for a while now. The splurge for his 30th birthday was heli-boarding on
Mt Cook-the highest mountain in New Zealand. There was a chance that Keith wouldn't be able to go heli-boarding-due to either weather conditions or because there weren't enough people going (minimum of 3 people). We ended up with 2 beautifully clear days and, unfortunately, no one else signed up to go heli-boarding.
So, what to do? We decided that we should give a scenic flight a go. I don't know why, but I find helicopters terrifying and was very happy that we ended up on a ski plane instead of a helicopter! We did the '
Glacier Highlights' flight:
Your flight with us begins in Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park. Fly the full length of the Tasman Glacier, passing Aoraki/Mount Cook before landing on the Tasman Glacier, the longest glacier in New Zealand. Once airborne the flight home features the spectacular Hochstetter Icefall. I felt the need to put that there to remind myself of what we were supposed to see, since I really didn't get to see it. Almost all the 'sights' were on the right and I was, sadly, on the left of the plane, trapped next to a giant man who was almost sitting on top of me and I could barely see a darn thing. Keith was in the front of the plane, so at least I got to hand my camera up to him, so I got to see some of the views on my camera after we landed.
One of the few times it was good to be on the left was the view over the mountains to the Tasman Sea. I really had no idea that we were so close to the west coast!
We landed on one of the many glaciers in the Southern Alps. The flight gave me an appreciation for just how massive the mountains, the glaciers, really the whole area is. But also how close everything is-we were so close to the other glaciers we had been to on the west coast:
Franz Joseph and
Fox-they were just on the other side of these mountains! It was also really nice to be on the top of a mountain without having to climbed it, although it always does feel a little better to earn the view than to just have it handed to you!
I had never been on such a small plane before or a ski plane for that matter. The skis in the front of the plane help the plane land in the snow-although from my front seat on the way back, it looked like they helped a little on take off in the snow too.
Just before we were about to land, I got hit with a massive headache-Keith thinks it was from the quick change in altitude. Anyway, I spent the afternoon nursing my headache while I checked out the exhibits at the museum and curled up with tea and book enjoying the view from our hotel. Keith, of course, went for a hike, which he reported back, I wouldn't have liked anyway-especially since he probably needed an ice ax and crampons for part of the time (but had neither)!
The next morning was bright and clear, so we were off to hike to Hooker Glacier terminal lake. The trail started pretty icy and stayed that way a lot of the time. After having gone to both the more touristy Fox and Franz Joseph glaciers, it was amazing that we could walk to this one without passing bus loads of tourists.
While we were hiking towards the glacier along the lake, we heard this constant noise. At first we thought it was a plane or helicopter in the area, but it was so long and consistent we decided it couldn't have been-was it the ice? We think so. It did sound like a constant, low motor running-ice makes that noise? That's crazy! The lake was also making normal (to me) crunchy, ice sounds. Who knew that glaciers and the lakes were they end were so noisy!
We had heard a few rockfalls on the hike but on the hike back we heard another sound that we didn't really expect to hear-an avalanche! It was a pretty little avalanche in the scheme of things, but still! We could just see the snow and debris falling down the face of a mountain maybe about a mile or so from us.
We are now in Alex-less than 2 weeks of work left for Keith! We are really ready to start the vacation time we have planned before we get back to the States-although what I am
really ready for is to see BJ!
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