This is a long post, so grab a fresh cuppa and sit back...
Mountains
We woke to a mostly-clear sky and a visible peak.
Marian had read of a nearby lake that is supposed to give reflected views of Mount Cook (highest peak in NZ) and adjacent Mt. Tasman, especially in the early morning. So we went out without breakfast in the chilly dawn light to find it.
The walk was mostly through deep woods only popping out to the lake at a few points. The first look suggested it was going to be nice.
And it just kept getting nicer as the sun got higher. Do click through on these!
Mt. Tasman, the one on the left, wore a fine cap of lenticular cloud.
The early light picked out the wooded foothills.
Scenery? Yeah, we got that...
There are some additional pics in the slideshow. But, even as we were finishing our walk, the clouds were moving in and hiding the whole top of the range. So the people who were unloading from the tour coach as we departed? They'll never know what us early birds saw.
Glacier
Yesterday we visited Franz Josef glacier; today we visited its neighbor 20km away, Fox glacier. The first look is from the road back from the lake.
All of that ice you see above is invisible when you approach the toe of the glacier.
There are teeny-tiny people in this one for scale, in the lower left.
The top of the glacier is very rough.
Pebbles
Now we headed south for Haast, which is mainly a wide spot in the road on the way to the center of the island.
View Larger Map
The road wound through forest,
past nice ocean vistas
(BTW, there is no road to that beach. There might be a trail.) Anyway, eventually we paused at Bruce Beach, which has to be the most fun beach in the world. It's a long, pretty beach that is just covered with the most gorgeous flat and cubical pebbles plus lots of interesting driftwood, and what everyone who goes there does, is to build a pile, a cairn, an artwork.
Anyway, on past forests whose look tells you that you aren't in the USA,
and finally, over the Longest One-Lane Bridge in New Zealand, 900m, almost a full kilometer,
So long it has two wide spots along the way.
Tomorrow was a day of a whole other sort, but we'll post that later tonight.
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