Glacier and snow-capped mountains (with a few autumn leaves!)

We landed in Christchurch to a sunny Good Friday afternoon and felt like we'd instantly left the surfer beaches of Oz and arrived in an English autumn.Despite being the biggest town in the South Christchurch felt like Oxford or Cambridge with its punting on the river, old buildings and autumn colours.

We soon moved on to Arthur's Pass the next day driving through the hills mountains in the sunshine.We stayed at Methven (a small town mainly used to get to ski slopes on Mt Hutt in the winter) for the rest of the Easter weekend.We felt right at home for the bank holiday as the rain started falling and the shops shut forcing us to take refuge in the hostel after a long soggy walk along a gorge.Watching afternoon films in the cosy lodge with some Cadbury's cream eggs was very relaxing!

Lake Tekapo was the next stop and another lovely hostel with a view of the lake and hills.Another chilled afternoon was spent admiring the view from the observatory and the Church of the good shepherd.

It was only a short drive to Mount Cook yesterday through more mountains (the drive keeps getting easier and more scenic!) and since the cloud was so low we took a couple of short walks and snuggled up to watch a couple of films followed by a sauna (who said hostel life would be hard?).The most spectacular views so far were revealed today!First glance out of the window showed the clouds to have lifted and the view to actually include a snow capped mountain (which hadn't even been visible yesterday).We were lucky to be going glacier kayaking in such great weather and by the time we were paddling across the Mueller Lake towards a glacier the skies were blue with a perfect view of Mt Cook (New Zealand's highest mountain).The water cloudy like milk from the ice was flat with icebergs poking out and we could hear the thunder of an avalanche in the distance.Once we'd kayaked across the lake we were able to taste the cold glacier water straight from the glacier.This afternoon with sun still shining we took the walk to an even better view of Mt Cook across Hooker Lake and glacier - beeeeeaaautiful!

We have a luvurly cabin style room tonight overlooking the mountain - let there be more sunshine (despite being back in hat and gloves) as we move back towards the east coast tomorrow.

Liz