After Sandra and Marlies left it was the Easter weekend, so Thomas and me went on another trip. We had planned to do the Queen Charlotte track in the North, but as usual were too late with organizing this, and we also realized we wouldn’t have enough time. So instead we went back via Lake Tekapo to Mount Cook/Aoraki to do some day hikes there.At the “base” of Mount Cook is a village, aptly named “Mount Cook Village”, which may well be in fact the only village in NZ. And indeed, it is pretty minimal. Especially because you drive this 55 km road along another glacial lake and all sorts of other glacial features until you can get no further without a helicopter or ice crampons, and there is the village.
The main attractions in the village are the old mountaineers café (lovely people, lovely food, intriguing story of their political struggle against the Monster Hotel next door), the Ed Hillary Alpine Centre (although more a spin off of the afore mentioned Monster Hotel) and obviously the scenery.
Ed in his younger years, looking up at Mt Cook
The weather was in a fight, from the West rain was coming, from the East better weather. We saw at least 3 rainbows a day. We didn’t actually see Mt Cook until the last day, but the weather meant interesting photos and a wild atmosphere.
We hiked up a mountain first (about halfway anyway) and had great views of the Mueller glacier. On the way down we met one of my (ex) colleagues and his girlfriend who were going up to the Mueller Hut. It’s so funny that in NZ you almost everywhere meet someone you know. Or how about this: I bought some magnets at the tourist shop and Thomas remarked that the “brand” was the last name of his current colleague at the emergency centre. I joked “well, must be his brother then!”. Turns out, it IS his brother…
Next day we drove/walked up to the Tasman glacier. Another example of Lonely Planet’s stupidity (sometimes). They said “due to the glaciers retreat nothing more than a pile of grey dirt and rocks are left”. However, not just us but everyone who came up was exclaiming “WOW!”. It’s not just a pile of dirt, Lonely Planet, it is moraines and a magnificent glacial landscape.
We then did the hike to the Hooker valley glacier, which became VERY windy towards the end (some Asian tourists were literally blown off their feet) but again just grand. If they weren’t so cold, I would have become a glaciologist…
Mt Cook/Aoraki finally in sunshine
Mt Sefton
The last day we drove back again via Lake Tekapo and did the day-tour of the observatory, by a not so inspiring astronomy student. He was really disappointed he couldn’t show us Alpha Centaurion and we had to made do with the second brightest star in the galaxy, but to us it was still just a sparkling little star far away … He also made the unforgivable remark “This hill is very stable, no problems with earthquakes. Pff, when a glacier moved over it, an earthquake isn’t going to shake it”. Yeah, yeah, so you may be a super intelligent astronomer, but your earth science knowledge is clearly limited as is your common sense. Earthquakes move everything.
The main attractions in the village are the old mountaineers café (lovely people, lovely food, intriguing story of their political struggle against the Monster Hotel next door), the Ed Hillary Alpine Centre (although more a spin off of the afore mentioned Monster Hotel) and obviously the scenery.
Ed in his younger years, looking up at Mt CookThe weather was in a fight, from the West rain was coming, from the East better weather. We saw at least 3 rainbows a day. We didn’t actually see Mt Cook until the last day, but the weather meant interesting photos and a wild atmosphere.
We hiked up a mountain first (about halfway anyway) and had great views of the Mueller glacier. On the way down we met one of my (ex) colleagues and his girlfriend who were going up to the Mueller Hut. It’s so funny that in NZ you almost everywhere meet someone you know. Or how about this: I bought some magnets at the tourist shop and Thomas remarked that the “brand” was the last name of his current colleague at the emergency centre. I joked “well, must be his brother then!”. Turns out, it IS his brother…
Next day we drove/walked up to the Tasman glacier. Another example of Lonely Planet’s stupidity (sometimes). They said “due to the glaciers retreat nothing more than a pile of grey dirt and rocks are left”. However, not just us but everyone who came up was exclaiming “WOW!”. It’s not just a pile of dirt, Lonely Planet, it is moraines and a magnificent glacial landscape.
We then did the hike to the Hooker valley glacier, which became VERY windy towards the end (some Asian tourists were literally blown off their feet) but again just grand. If they weren’t so cold, I would have become a glaciologist…
Mt Cook/Aoraki finally in sunshine
Mt SeftonThe last day we drove back again via Lake Tekapo and did the day-tour of the observatory, by a not so inspiring astronomy student. He was really disappointed he couldn’t show us Alpha Centaurion and we had to made do with the second brightest star in the galaxy, but to us it was still just a sparkling little star far away … He also made the unforgivable remark “This hill is very stable, no problems with earthquakes. Pff, when a glacier moved over it, an earthquake isn’t going to shake it”. Yeah, yeah, so you may be a super intelligent astronomer, but your earth science knowledge is clearly limited as is your common sense. Earthquakes move everything.
