17th-18th May
We got to Fox Glacier early in the morning and had breakfast in the van before heading to the glacier car park. The track to the glacier terminal face was fully open today and the weather was a little cloudy but not too bad. The track had to be changed due to all the bad weather they have had lately and they had to lay big rocks in place over numerous streams to use them as stepping stones. You could see quite a lot of the glacier from the terminal face which was good, and again you could see how far it has retreated! It's awful really. After the walk we drove to Lake Matheson and did a walk around that again, only this time it wasn't raining and we did actually get quite a good reflection of Mount Cook in the lake. It was that still and clear it literally looked like a mirror! After the morning in Fox Glacier we set off for Greymouth.
The drive to Greymouth took about 2 and a half hours and it was a drive (most of the way) we would have done now for the 3rd time! It was still nice though and it looked different every time with the ever changing weather. We spent a couple of hours in Greymouth at a computer shop sorting our pictures out and then got a big KFC bucket to share, which we took to the van and drove to our camping spot to enjoy overlooking the coast.
We stayed for the night at the same spot we stayed last time we were in Greymouth, Jelliman Park, right next to the sea. It was too cloudy to see a west coast sun set which was a shame but we enjoyed sleeping again with the sound of the waves crashing just outside.
On the 18th we set off early for the 4 and a half hour journey over to Kaikoura- the last big drive of the trip :( it is very sad, but we are looking forward to our next adventures in Oz.