West Coast

We took two days to cross the mountains through Haast Pass before dropping down onto the stunning west coast, with its lush rain forests (some parts receive more than 15 ft of rain a year), jagged snow-covered mountain ranges, and driftwood-dotted beaches.

Brett and us at Knight's Point

We stumbled across a wonderful treat at Bruce's Bay as we drove north. Seeing a number of campervans pulled off the side of the road, we too decided to stop and see what the attraction was. We found thousands of little rock and driftwood shrines built along a quarter-mile stretch of highway; many of the rocks had names, dates, and pictures drawn on them and some of the wood pieces had been roughly carved. We wandered around for a while, reading the different inscriptions from travelers from various countries -- Brazil, China, the U.S., Germany, Japan, Australia, and many, many others. Naturally, we added one of our own, using a pen to write our names on a smooth, white stone and placed it in the midst of this impromptu gallery.

This is just a tiny section of the shrines


We loved this friendly looking driftwood monster

We stayed for two nights at a free (!) campground on Gillespies' Beach, which is set on the edge of a large lagoon, marshlands, and a very dense rain forest...and only about 15 miles from the Fox Glacier.

The view from the beach at sunset, looking east toward the Southern Alps, including Mt. Cook and Mt. Tasman

We were blessed with a very nice day for a hike to nearby Galloway Beach for a picnic lunch and a visit to the seal colony there. According to the map at the trailhead, the trail started by crossing the lagoon by bridge. It turned out that the "bridge" only spans the parts of the lagoon that are more than knee deep, the rest of the time you are apparently expected to wade through the standing water. Unfortunately, Louisa, who was leading the way, miscalculated the depth of the water and ended up with sopping wet boots and socks. It was not so bad on such a warm day, though it was quite squishy!

Louisa attempting to squeeze as much water out of her boots as possible. As a side note, the boots did recover and were fully dried in a few days


Sean on the "trail"

Louisa and Brett on the bridge. As you can see, he and Sean learned from Lou's mistake and saved their footwear from the same wet fate as hers.

From the beach, we drove about 20 minutes the next day, through farmland and rain forest, to the terminal end of the Fox Glacier.

The Fox in the distance


The terminal end of the glacier, as seen from the trail

Later that day, we drove an hour north to see the Franz Josef Glacier as well.

The Franz Josef. Both glaciers are retreating and you can see in this photo where, for some years, there was a lake formed by melting glacial ice.

The glacier carved out this deep valley and the floor is still covered by rock and pools of water tinted blue by the famous glacier sediment

A small river runs out from under the terminal end of the Franz Josef. It is prone to sudden floods and course changes.