Friday, December 17, 2010

Fox Glacier

We spent Friday night in a campsite near Haast, the rain hammering down on our puny little campervan from dusk til dawn. I was woken by Hannah's distressed cries; she had just discovered that her trousers had fallen out of the van when she went to the toilet during the night and were now lying in a muddy puddle.

We sheltered from the rain in the kitchen, finding time to chat to a Kiwi couple who, it turned out, had worked at the same place as Hannah in Lymington during the 90s. Finally, we plucked up the courage to high tail it out of there. We headed for the most southerly part of the west coast that can be reached by road (apart from Milford Sound): Jackson Bay.





Unfortunately, Jackson Bay was a bit rubbish in the rain and we only spent a few minutes there before the sandflies chased us back to the van. It's a shame that the weather was so terrible because I bet that there would have been some lovely views of the mountains on a sunny day.



Next, we headed up the coast to the Fox Glacier which might or might not have been named after a brand of sweets. We decided to visit the glacier ourselves, rather than paying a fortune to take part in a guided tour. The torrential rain again cussed our plans:



Still, we could see some of the glacier beyond the safety barriers and it was an awesome sight.



The cliffs at the side of the valley were impressive too. Notice how the strata in the rock are nearly vertical, which is indicative of some kind of geological process having folded the rock.



One result of the recent rainfall was that, downstream from the glacier, the Fox River was a raging torrent of water and ice:



On our way back down the valley, we sighted a "historic bridge". This was built many years ago and was used by visitors to access the glacier back when the glacier extended a little further down the valley.



Hannah didn't fancy crossing the bridge for some reason so I crossed it alone. It was actually pretty scary with the river below in full flow:



Sadly, we didn't have time to stick around any longer and we headed off to the DOC campsite where Hannah attempted to dry her trousers out on our Bear Grylls style washing line. It was a shame to have to leave so soon. I would have loved to get a closer look at the Fox Glacier or its slightly more famous neighbour the Franz Joseph Glacier.

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