Stayed in Nelson over night in a really fun hostel, Paradiso. Played drinking games with people in the hostel and spent an evening on a static bus in the garden. Was fun.
Our coach picked us up at 7am the following morning so as you can imagine we were a little tender and slept the WHOLE way. Arrived in Franz Josef at around 4.30pm and spent the following two nights there. We went to Franz Josef to do the Glacier Trek! YES you heard me.. Another Trekk. Luckily this one was only 4 hours and was way more professional. We even had special boots to walk on the ice and waterproof warm clothing. Now that wouldn't have happened in Chiang Mai. Simon would have probably carved us some sort of ice pick to survive.
We were VERY close to Backing out last minute as we were already absolutely freezing in flip flops and clothes for South East Asia humidity but we knew we would regret it, after-all that was the reason we were in Franz Josef.
We spent two hours on the ice Glaciers which was a little scary but really fun and looked absolutely incredible. We were surrounded by massive natural iced glacier. The colours of the ice crystals against the mountains looked so pretty. The walk before we got to the Glaciers wasn't so spectacular. Spent an hour walking in torrential rain/hail. and I think Shell just looked at us and said 'NOT AGAIN! What are we doing?' We all found it very amusing though. got some great snaps with us posing in natural iced pot holes and actually enjoyed every minute of It. Not sure how we would have felt if we chose the full day option.