Oh my good lord, what a day! And I thought we'd already seen how spectacular scenery can get here on the South Island... It's been an action packed day of natural wonder spotting, en route from Franz Josef to Wanaka. We started the day with a trip to see Lake Matheson. The water in the lake appears almost black because of the secretions from the vegetation, which creates a mirrored effect. On a clear day it looks awesome because you can see Mt. Tasman and Mt. Co...

We're still in Franz Josef and couldn't leave until tomorrow because of bus timetables. We've seen the glacier, I've done a rainforest walk and that's about all there is to do, so today has mostly been about killing time. After the extreme sock shopping we did in Auckland, we thought we'd crank things up a notch and really go wild, so we engaged in some white knuckle Scrabble action. Jim was deeply unhappy with my two letter word knowledge (all that practise on ...

We've had a pretty incredible time here in Franz Josef today, getting involved in a full day guided hike on the Glacier. We checked-in with Franz Josef Glacier Guides at 8.15am, got kitted out in our waterproofs and boots and headed off to see the Glacier. It was a 40 minute walk alone to the terminal face, leading us through a rainforest and stream, and involved climbing a very precarious walkway on the side of a hill. You'd NEVER be allowed to do this kind of ...

We were delighted to leave Greymouth this morning, though given the choice we might have opted for a bit of a lie in - I look like I've been punched, the rings around my eyes are so bad. Nevertheless, we were back on the bus at 8am and heading south... First up was Hokitika, the home of greenstone production in New Zealand. We had a break there for half an hour or so, where I spent approximately three minutes looking in the greenstone factory before going to dri...

Another catch up blog I'm afraid. This time my excuse is that the computers at the last hostel seemed to have keyboards made of lead and the RSI that I sustained from just logging on to the internet rendered me incapable of typing anymore. I was so tired yesterday that I was practically boz-eyed but we piled onto the Magic Bus with our very funny new driver at 8am. We headed south through the Hope Saddle and across the Buller Gorge to the West Coast. Our first ...