NZ Christchurch

I got into CHC at midnight and was able to pick up my rental from a hotel just outside the airport. Everything was closed, this is NZ and nothing is 24/7, so I just went to sleep in the car until I could buy eggs Benedict with salmon for brekkie then grocery shop.

As I drove out of town I saw a park and this spectacular limestone rock formation called Castle Hill. I have a thing for big rocks. I took the hike out to see them. I didn't realize how far away I was. Seriously big rocks, like a single slab was 100m high. Very weathered too, ancient. These rocks didn't look very climbable by myself, too smooth and lacking features. Anyway i explored a bit and took pictures.

I drove the two hours to Arthur's Pass and the wx looked fine, but I talked to the park guy who is an avid mountaineer. He was optimistic except for the 75kmph winds. He informed me that you will blow over if kmph equals your kg, and I was to be climbing a razorback with a 300m sheer drop on both sides. I also weigh 75kg. I decided not to die today and on-on to plan b.

But not before I realized I popped a tire pulling into the park offices. Dooh! Conveniently I can fix anything and had the donut installed in about 10 minutes.

Plan B was to check out the glaciers on the west coast, one of the only places in the world where glaciers flow into a rainforest. I drove the next 3.5 hours towards Frans Josef glacier taking a stop at this cute seaside town for lunch and a smoothie. I also kept my kmph down because I don't want the donut to explode at an inopportune moment which is pretty much all the time on NZ's squiggly roads.

I must say that this far the south island is immensely easier to drive than the north part of the north island. Those were some damn squiggly roads! Also, this is a very unpopulated stretch of coast. Nobody lives out here, no traffic and there aren't any safe harbors or easy way to put boats in. The Tasman sea looks rough too.

Anyway I checked out the little town of Frans Josef, and then I drove and hiked to the glacier. I was a bit unimpressed by the glacier itself, but the mountains were pretty impressive. The moraine is very unstable so the closest I could get to the glacier is 750m. So they say... You used to be able to walk on it from the path. As it turns out the glacier is shrinking very rapidly due to the past 20 years of climate change. An info Packard shows pics from this prominence taken over the years. the last pic was 2010 and they had an artist's rendition of 2100, and today it looked well past the 2100 pic. Now the only way to get on it is a 350$ heli ride. Considering I'm about to live on the Tasman glacier for over a week, and the cloud cover halted operations, I'm not interested in a chopper ride.

After I finished with this walk I drove 30 mins and hiked down to the Fox glacier. This was a much more interesting hike despite the cold drizzle. The whole walk is along the changing moraine field. There is greenstone (Jade) scattered everywhere. I was amazed at all the Jade on the ground, and I see what the Maori call it greenstone and treasure the gem quality stuff highly. I kept looking for a high quality piece, but there is a reason Jade is expensive.

The Fox glacier itself was more impressive, and I was only 450m away. The rocks fascinated me because most were a mica and quartz schist (greywacky) that was so easily frangible. The Jade was also a schist usually. The walls of the canyon were made of a dolomitic schist with quartz and jadeite inclusions. The harder schists were infrangible and hence they survived the abuse of the glaciation, whereas most of the schists broke along their planes and crumbled easily. you could see huge 5m boulders scattered, and they were hard schist as well. Right at the glacier face one half of the canyon was clearly a different rock while the other crumbling face was broken scree schist. it is my conclusion that these gorges aren't actually formed by the glacier. rather it is the quality of the rock that makes the gorge possible, and the glacier just works out the weak and loose bits. It was pretty fascinating.

At the lookout I got to see a very rare kea, the world's only Alpine parrot. He was a cute fella, not scared of me as I snapped pics rapidly. He approached within 2 m of me frequently. He seemed very smart. Kinda bulky for a parrot with a long hooked nose, green and grey coloration. When he flew he had bright white armpits with red underwings and tail. Anyway there are only an estimated 5000 of them surviving, almost all of them around Mount Cook/Aoraki so I was fortunate to see him. At least he can fly unlike NZs other birds.

Btw Mt Cook is the monster that feeds these glaciers. If wx were good I would be able to see the top of it at 12000'. But the cloud deck was at 400m which just started to cover the top of the glaciers.

Tomorrow I have two hike plans, one 8 hour hike to a knob that looks down on the valley (epic views of glacier and moraine valley out to the sea) and another that looks fun with rope bridges and waterfalls at 5.5 hours. The high one I'll only do if that cloud deck clears, because it would be a lot of pointless cardio if I couldn't get some good pics. Either way afterwards I'm booked for some hot baths, just. because that is awesome after a good hike. I knew I brought my togs for something.

I think I'll stay the night here again, and Monday I'll head back to Arthurs Pass and see if I can climb that mountain that I wanted to without certain death.

And at some point I need to figure out what I need to do with the rental. This is the first time in a while that I actually paid for rental insurance, and I'm keen to take advantage of it by doing nothing and returning the car with the donut and letting them deal with it. My policy covered tyre damage.

On the negative side, this island is undeveloped. One thing I enjoyed about the North was all the tramping tracks at every green space. I drove through some epic green spaces with majestic treeferns and other flora, but nobody lives here so nobody has cut trails through all of it. And this is no joke rain forest, shiggy 8-10 all the way, so I have no interest in bushbeating myself a track. I actually attempted it because I had an interest for about 50m, no bueno. However on this trip I'm missing the far north and south. Next time!