October 11, 2019
We had travelled to the west coast of New Zealand to see the glaciers. Firstly we drove over Haast Pass. Along the way we tramped in the rain across a swing bridge to see the Blue Pools. The water was grey coloured on the cloudy rainy day.
On we went to the glaciers. There was lots of waterfalls spraying water out onto the road as we drive.
During the last ice age 20000 years ago the glaciers reached the sea. That would have been amazing to see!
We passed the town Fox Glacier as the road to the glacier was closed. Back in March 2019 this area on the west coast had 800mm of rain in 3 days. This caused lots of road damages. Presently you could only access Fox glacier by helicopter.
We were staying at Franz Joseph the next town along. It was bucketing cats and dogs all day and all night! We played pool and ate lots of food in the Monsoon Bar.
We drove out to see the Franz Joseph glacier but there was so much fog you couldn’t see anything.
The next morning we got back up again and headed back to the glacier. It was still raining but mum said get on your rain jacket and pants. Mum told Grace if she stayed in the car a mammoth Kiwi might come out of the bush and eat her!!! Grace quickly got on her rain pants and jacket!
The walk was lots of fun! You could see lots of waterfalls.
There was an old photograph that showed how far the glacier went to in 1867. I could see a little bit of it at the sign and it was NO WHERE CLOSE to that now!
We walked up the track hoping the fog would not be in the valley. The clouds and fog started to clear some more. There was a lookout section and we could see the glacier.
It looked really blue compared to the sides mountain valley.
We walked on a bit more then came across a DANGAR SIGN that advised people not to walk on any further due to the flooding water.
Glad we got to see the glacier!
We moved further up the west coast the next day to Hokitika where mum had booked a house on the beach. Penny and Grace made a big hot fire to warm up our cottage. A roast was in the oven and we started a jigsaw and watched the sunset.
By Finn
