Franz Josef Glacier YHA South Island

Here's what happened on our '18 Day Whistle Stop Tour' of the South Island in a very aged, battered, scraped tiny Toyota 'Starlet' 1.3 Auto (yes 'auto' for those that didn't realise you could get such a small engine in an auto - we requested a manual but they couldn't provide!) 25th - 27th March CHRISTCHURCH. After catching our plane by default, we arrived safely at some ungodly hour after a very pleasant flight with real cornflakes and much needed a cup of tea/coffee (cheers Tim for getting ...

One of only two glaciers in the world to reach down to temperate rainforest, Franz Josef was an amazing experience!

yesterday started out with us travelling to franz josef in the morning and was enlivened by one great truck stop at the bushman centre out in the forest full of sarcastic and anti auckland messages the highlight was the video on deer hunting - it turns out that after importing deer from scotland they bred like crazy and became a pest so they initially started culling them then tried capturing them to breed in captivity - the funniest bits were the attempts at capturing the deer ranging from n...

Hello again! After a long 9 hour bus ride I made it to Franz Josef in the evening on Thursday night. Luckily, I've made a great friend with this girl Roos from Holland (pronounced "Rose") who has become my travel buddy. She is hilarious and we're had a blast together on the bus... And get your minds out of the gutter, she has a boyfriend ;-) Anyways the Dutch are too damn tall, she's nearly 6 foot. But we've had a blast together and I'm sure we'll have some good laughs. I was only planning on...

Well I woke to a grey day that turned into a wet day. After checking out of the Purple Cow I headed north. I past view after view, by now I've become almost numb by them and don't go Wow as much. As I entered the Haast pass the radio in the car lost all signals so I started a new game of read the road signs. My favourate so far is windbag creek, although I'm still looking for the one I can travel without a paddle. Driving on these roads you can see how people can make a mistake and drive stra...

This'll be short and sweet, as I wanted to report on today while it was still fresh in my mind. After years of wanting to try skydiving (and an aborted attempt last week), I finally got to leap out of a plane this afternoon! First things first, though... Greymouth is a boring town. But it has good pizza, which is a rarity in New Zealand. The kiwis only seem to enjoy pizza with ******************* on it (especially onions), which offends my puritanical pizza sensibilities. For example, buying ...

Saturday 2009-04-18 to Monday 2009-04-20 For Swedish please see below. Franz Josef - an increadible glacier adventure From its origins high in the Southern Alps, the Franz Josef Glacier descends deep into the rainforest of Westland National Park. It is truely one of the most spectacular glacial environments in the world! During the glacier valley wallk we venture through the lush rainforest, creeks and waterfalls, beyond the public barriers, right up to the dramatic terminal face of this adva...

Today's journey was from Arthur's Pass to Franz Joseph Glacier. There is basically just one road: through the mountains to the coast and then down the coast. The views are less breathtaking than yesterday's, but still lovely: tree-clad mountains above stony riverbeds; tree-ferns and other greenery along the verges, and some little towns. From Arthur's Pass the road rises over the pass itself and falls down the other side via the Otira viaduct. Built in 1990 to replace what must have been a so...