Monday, April 17, 2006

Moving at Glacial Speed

Today was a day of frozen ice. We visited the Franz Joseph and Fox glaciers, located about 25K apart. There are two tourist towns each at the base of their respected glacier, offering helicopter flights and extreme glacial experiences to anyone brave enough. Needless to say, we stuck to the main trail.

The Franz Joseph was the more memorable of the two, having an hour and a half walk to get to the front. Along the way, there were various barriers warning people not to pursue any further, as you would be iniment danger and certain death would result. At the same time, we would look up the trail and see a family with kids strolling merrily along. Couldn't be too dangerous, we thought. Besides, we were residents along the Hayward fault at one point.

Peggy and I snuck under the barrier and made our way close to the mouth of the river that ran through the glacier. All along the banks were giant ice chunks in various states of decay. One wouldn't want to get caught in the mouth of the ice cave when the next piece fell.

Ferns do very well for themselves here, the entire country seems to be covered in rainforest. It is so lush and tropical, what one would imagine Hawaii to be like, except a bit colder. There has been scattered showers - one minute glorious sunshine, the next drenching rain. We're hypothesizing that the Eastern coast will be a bit dryer than the west, given the direction of the weather patterns blowing in from the Tasman Sea.

posted by ncawthon at 7:18 PM