Glaciers
Trip Start
Aug 17, 2003
1
43
76
Trip End
Jun 04, 2004
Franz Josef,
New Zealand
Tuesday, February 10, 2004
Unfortunately despite having a beautiful day all day, as soon as we got to Franz Josef, the clouds started to close in, and we couldn't actually see the glacier the town is named after. But it didn't cloud up too much, which meant I was able to do another scenic flight, up over the mountains and glaciers.
The flight was fantastic, not least because the company had shunted me in with another group who were on a longer flight than I'd paid for, so I got a fantastic deal! We flew up over the Fox glacier, which is just next door to Franz Josef, and then spent the next 30 minutes or so flying around the tops of the Fox, Franz Josef and Tasman glaciers, and around Mount Cook and Mount Tasman
Brrr it's cold in here....
. The views really were stunning, with snow capped mountains leading down to beautifully blue lakes and green valleys. Incredible. I was also absolutely amazed to see a group of climbers at the top of one of the glaciers, apparently heading to spend the night in one of the huts up there. Now that's keen....The next day, I headed off again to see the glacier from another angle, much much closer this time.... I was doing a full day hike on the glacier, complete with crampons and ice axes - great fun!!!! We got picked up from our accommodation and taken to the shop to get fully kitted out with boots (v. uncomfortable), socks (v. thin) and all the other bits and pieces. I was very very relieved to see Gore Tex jackets being handed out, especially as the weather forecast was for heavy rain to start around lunch time.
We then drove up to the carpark nearest the glacier, and started on the 2.5km walk that came before we even got to start slipping about on the ice. That was hard enough walk. It was possibly a sign of things to come that before long the group was spread out a long way along the valley floor, with the guide at the front setting one hell of a pace, and a crowd of us at the back taking the time to look around us and take photos. But we all caught up with each other at the base of the glacier and got ready to start climbing the ice
Digging the steps
. Ahead we could see a number of other guides hacking out the steps of the path for us with their ice axes. And others doing general safety checks. An arch had formed as a result of the glacier moving, and so they were hacking at one end of it to force it to fall in. As people often climb on the bottom sections of the glacier without the right gear and without having the faintest idea what they're doing, it could have been quite dangerous. And when it fell in, it certainly made on hell of a noise!
We walked the first 20 or so steps up the glacier in just our boots, which was pretty interesting - I was being very careful where I stepped, but still managed to slide a few times.... And then it was time for the fun - crampons! Trying to put on a pair of rusty crampons balancing on one leg on a fairly small bit of slippery ice which already has another 20 people standing on it is a feat in itself. All quite interesting! But we got there in the end.
Next was splitting into two groups - the "espresso" and the "latte" (I think they were trying to avoid offending anyone by saying fast and slow). Not that I'm saying that there was any testosterone flying about the place, but it was interesting that it pretty much split into boys and girls.... But we were quite happy with that. We were able to take more time, have more breaks, and take lots more pictures. And in actual fact, nearly the whole time we could see the other group just 500m ahead of us!! We could certainly hear them most of the time!!
And then off we headed up the glacier
Fox Glacier névé
. Which was actually pretty hard work - lots of steps, with heavy crampons on your feet to make it just that little bit harder. After about 30 minutes on the ice, we stopped and I got some extra blister tape to put on my heels, as they were starting to rub, and I didn't want them to get any worse. At which point one of the other people in the group took her boots off to show open, bleeding blisters the size of 10p pieces on each heel already. I don't know how she was managing to walk. Incredible.The hike was really cool, climbing up over steps and walking through crevasses and ice caves. It was incredible seeing the pure ice in the centre of the glacier, which was just such an amazing blue colour - unbelievable! It was great to be able to get that close to the ice. We whiled the time away telling each other jokes, which became progressively filthy as we got to know each other better. It helped having an essex girl in the group, who seemed to know a hell of a lot of them! I'll see if I can try to remember some of them to tell you all another time.
A few bits were slightly dicey, like when the steps were quite widely spaced, so you really needed to use the ice axe to steady yourself on the way up - and as I did it, the axe slipped and I started overbalancing backwards - about 4 feet up!!! Not great, but luckily all those years of avoiding falling on skis paid off and I managed somehow to throw my balance back!
The best part probably about the hike was that we were really lucky with the weather - with the exception of a few spots, the promised rain never came, so we had great views, and almost dry clothes
Franz Josef from the river valley
. In fact, the wettest we got was from squeezing through the bottoms of crevasses - sometimes along gaps that were only just wide enough to get the hips through (we did start to wonder whether they have a fattist policy - some of the yanks I've met would never have got through those gaps....)When I got back down to the bottom, I was tired and sore (my knees were really aching), but really glad I'd done it - it was a great experience. But I was slightly worried that I found the actual walking so hard, as I'm supposed to be doing the Inca Trail in 3 months, and that's 4 days of walking up and down hills! Hopefully hills are less hard on the knees than steps are!!!
