Westward Ho

To Fox Glacier, New Zealand

The rough schedule we planned out had us leaving Queenstown today. However, since the kids had never made it to the top of the hill with the gondola -- the spot from which paragliders were constantly spiraling down -- we decided to at least do that before leaving town. First, though was breakfast at the excellent Bespoke Kitchen cafe just a few blocks away. The smoothie bowl I ordered was a work of art.

Since we were making the journey up the hill on the gondola this time, we also sprung for lüge tickets. We had really enjoyed the little bobsled ride we had done in the Snowy Mountains of Australia, so this seemed worth a try. This time however, we were expected to steer the little carts along a concrete course. Yee haw!  It was a blast though Kylie decided after the first run that she preferred doubling up with Meg or me.

Luge run

Bungy anyone?

After the luge excitement, we headed back down to start our drive over to the west coast and the famous glaciers of Fox and Franz Josef. It was a beautiful but long drive, featuring rugged mountains, golden grassy hills, and plenty of sheep.

Once on the coast, the clouds crept in and it was clear from the dozens of rivers, walls of ferns lining the road, and the seemingly impenetrable moss-covered beech trees, that this area gets plenty of moisture -- the guidebook said upwards of five meters (16 feet) a year! We stopped at one wide river to skip the endless supply of flat, round rocks. I'm pretty sure we could have stayed for hours if not for the evil, little sand flies, which soon chased us back to the car. We raced out of the parking lot with windows open, slapping and swatting the little buggers.

Great skipping rocks.  Dex and Meg showing their form.

As we approached our campground, we were amazed to see snow covered peaks just behind the nearer hills. We guessed that the highest peak was none other than Mt Cook, the very mountain we had driven to see the day De Ann had arrived. Surprisingly, we had driven from Christchurch on the east coast that first day and had thus practically reached the west coast, lined by the Southern Alps.

Mt Cook I presume

Once in our caravan park, Dex, Kylie and I amused ourselves at the playground racing to make a full circuit on the monkey bars, ropes and ladders. I'm very pleased to say I prevailed, just barely beating out the nine year old competition. I'll take the win since I'm afraid the writing is on the wall ... I will soon be the slow one.