Ok so we are tired of early starts but today we have a great and exciting day planned. At 7:45am we left our little chalet in Franz Josef and headed back to Fox Glacier Village. We had a ½ day Fox Trot hiking tour booked for 8:35am to go out on to the Fox Glacier. Once booked in we had to put socks on and proper hiking boots. We had just a short bus ride to the glacier car park, Our guide Danni lead us on a walk beside the river bed to the glacier terminus. From here we walked uphill for around 30 minutes to access the edge of the ice. We all grabbed a hiking stick, except for Daniel cause he's too short for one. We hiked a short distance passed a rock fall area and then to a flat area. At this point we fitted our shoes with crampons specially designed for walking on ice. We then followed Danni up the ice steps. Occasionally she had to cut the steps away with her big axe. The route took us onto the ice amongst crevasses and ice ridges and lead us onto the middle of the glacier for spectacular views of the ice and lower glacier. Fox Glacier was named in 1872 after a visit by the then Prime Minister of New Zealand Sir William Fox.
We spent at least one hour on the ice. Danni was with us for the duration of the trip in case of any rock falls or breaks in the ice. We enjoyed listening to fascinating details of the natural history of the landscape. The top of the glacier is moving 6meters a day and it was only 100meters thick where we walking. The ice we were walking on was 60 years old. The glacier is 13km long and at the top its 600meters thick. The experts say that the glacier will be completely gone in 100 years. We were very fortunate to hike (The Kiwi's call hiking “tramping”) on the glacier with magnificent weather.
After we got back to Fox Glacier Village we had some lunch at the cafe and then had another drive in front of us. Today we are staying in a town called Greymouth. The drive was again very spectacular with snow capped mountains, fast running rivers and views of the Tasman Sea. We made a quick stop at a town called Hokitika where you can buy jewellery out of green stone. It was very pricey so we got back into the car and headed to our accommodation in Greymouth. We are all very exhausted from our hike on the Glacier.
