glacier

New Zealand South Island Road trip 2025 – Aoraki

| flynny101

From the Clay Cliffs we make our way up to White Horse Hill campground which is nestled below the towering peak of Aorali/Mount Cook.

White Horse Hill is a paid ground. During the winter the main toilet/shower blocks are closed off as the frequent negative temperatures lead to burst pipes and what not. What you are left with is two of the smelliest drop toilets I’ve ever encountered, And I’ve done long weekends at Newnes Camp ground in it’s heyday.

Take the biggest breath you can here and hold it as long as you can, a young whipper snapper was heard giving advice to her younger brother…..

Don’t let that put you off though, the scenery is well worth a skinny loo or two.

We roll in late afternoon and set the camp up. The temperature is already -2ºC and falling. The little diesel heater fitted in the van is amazing.

As night settles in and the temp plummets to -8º we decide to brave it for the sake of the most amazingly clear night sky.

Clicky Clicky to see full photo

The next day we head out on the Hooker Valley Trail.

Normally this gives the closest access to the base Aoraki the general public will get and also views over the proglacial Hooker Lake, complete with icebergs, however only a short section of the trail was open at the time of our visit due to track work and a bridge being washed out.

the short open section did, however provide great views over the Mueller Glacier and it’s lake.

Next we return to the van and duck over to the village for a coffee. While there we dropped in to the Department of Conservation information centre.

Wow!!!

What an amazing free resource. If you were in the area and the weather was bad you could easily spend a whole day in here. There are displays and videos and more lots more.

But today was a blue bird day so we have a quick look and then head over towards the Tasman Glacier.

Here you can take helicopter tour or a boat tour on the lake. We opt to just do the tourist walks.

Sitting between NZ’s two tallest peaks the Tasman is New Zealand’s largest glacier, being up to 4km wide and 600m thick in places. It had remained a fairy constant 28km long through out its recorded history up until it starting to retreat in the 1990s. It’s currently 23km long and retreating on average 180m/year.

Looking up the lake from the tourist lookout the glacier is’t much to look at. Compared to the white snow and crystal blue ice on the Franz Josef, the Tasman crunches up and contains a lot more rock and minerals (Glacier flour), giving it a dark, almost dirty appearance. Without the information sign at the I doubt most people, me included, would pick it out in the distance.

The lake, however is stunning.

The Blue Pools. When named they were connected to the glacier and very blue. Now they are cut off they are more a stagnant green.

Back at the van we start heading back down the valley.

On the way in I’d caught a glimpse of Wakefield Falls. It caught my eye on the way back out.

Is that waterfall frozen?

Looks like it.

It’s difficult to come to terms with scale here. That waterfall tumbles 230 vertical meters.

We pull over for a better look.

Na, it’s flowing. Looks like a cracker of a slot it’s tumbling into.

Should we go for a look.

hell yeah.

I grab the camera and off we go.

There is what appears to be a former tourist trail that comes and goes through the scrub and scree.

Did I mention it is hard to come to terms with scale here? It becomes apparent it’s further than it first looked.

Belatedly I realise in my excitement to get going I failed to grab my puffer jacket and beanie. This is how silly tourist get themselves on the news kids. Luckily not today though

Halfway up we meet to Russian(?) guys coming back down.

Did you get to the waterfall? ask we

Yes yes. Beautiful. Very careful. Very careful.

We push on. We reach the end of the flatter basin and the terrain gets steeper and looser. We had been yeeting up but slow here. A rolled ankle, rock fall or dislodging the scree here would be bad indeed.

There is still a fair way to go. Says Kylie. We should set a hard stop point.

Good idea.

It had been about 2:15pm when we left the van. We decide at 3:15 we need to turn around to get back prior to loosing the light.

I think we gained about 200m of elevation from the road. A bit after 3pm we get to a point where we had a a reasonable view into the slot where 3 streams of the falls converge.

We are so close. Another 10-15min and we’d be at the base of the falls. but hard stops are hard stops and but I know by the time I get the camera set up and get some shot we’d be close to time so thats what we do.

I’d guesstimate the bottom tier you can see here is about 50m tall

We get the shots and video in and scoot back down.

Part way down we come across this old information sign. Weird spot but I guess the old tourist track came up to this vantage point.

Explaining how the moraines pushed up by the glaciers formed dams in the rivers as the glacier retreated. or sumfink

Back at the van we chug down the road making for a freedom camp at lake Pukaki

New Zealand Road Trip 2025 – Franz Josef Glacier

| flynny101

From Hokitika it was an early start to drive down for our next adventure.

When planning our itinerary Kylie had mentioned a walk up towards the base of a glacier she had previously done and loved and while we had been trying to keep it a low cost holiday we had also been tossing up splurging on helicopter tour.

I remembered my old mate and mentor, Rusty (RIP) having done a heli/hike tour onto a glacier and raving about it.

If we do the helicopter I’d love a snow or glacier landing, Say I.

That’s a great idea Kylie replies.

We begin looking into options trying to decide what would fit our wants and itinerary. Franz Josef Glacier Guides started looming large as the front runner.

This is the one part of our holiday where we decided to dam the expense and splash a bit of cash on. IMO it was worth every cent.

Just driving into town is mind-blowing as we get our first close encounter with the snowcapped peaks while walking down streets lined with giant fern trees.

While FJGG supply all the outer layers to keep their clients warm they were more than happy for us to use our own gear (after confirming that it was suitable).

Our guide, Maya, was informative, funny and chill as she took us through the safety talk. That’s worst case, says she. It won’t happen today… I hope. Na, it won’t happen.

Suitably prepared we leave town via a lovely walk through the rain forest to the helipad. The group would be split into 2. And our group were first up with Maya joining us and our chopper pilot Matt giving great commentary along the way.

We had been assigned seating and Kylie had jagged a front seat, allowing her to capture some amazing videos.

Even with Matt’s commentary it was hard to come to grips with the scale of this place. It wasn’t until we were down and looking back to the following helicopter that was just a tiny speck against the mountainous back drop that it started sinking in.

Once both groups were on the ice Maya guided us on a 2.5hr loop around the glacier with lots of facts, anecdotes, and Maori legends thrown in.

Kylie was in her element, engaging in her specialities of climate science, glacial processes, and paleo-river systems. Her smile was beaming and her eyes sparkling.

It was a great experience and I’d highly recommend it.

We had jagged a perfect bluebird day. Summer is their peak season but a clear winter’s day is the perfect time to visit.

Anyhoo, we took about a thousand photos between us. Here are some of my favourite ones of mine.

Click to expand

Canyon anyone?
We are standing on a glacier looking at a beach!!!
Standing on a Glacier looking at a sunset over a beach!!!

Would 100% do it again

And on an absolute high from this we cruise down to Bruce Bay for camp

Exploring Glaciers at Lunch followed by sunsets on the beach for diner.

It was a bit surreal