Arthur's Pass, West Coast, Franz Josef & Fox Glaciers

I have safely returned back to Auckland after my adventurous 2 1/2 week trip to the South Island. It'll definitely take some time to recount the highlights from this incredible trip, but I'll just have to start at the beginning. We flew into Christchurch and began by picking up our Escape campervans and our impromptu small yellow car. We headed to the local grocery store and stocked up on our necessary food items such as pasta, rice, canned tuna, and granola bars. After some small obstacles, we hit the road and headed to Arthur's Pass, which a small village in the middle of the Southern Alps. It was raining pretty heavily the whole time we were there, but we still enjoyed camping there for the night. In the morning we hiked to the Devil's Punchbowl Waterfall before continuing on to the west coast.



Once we made it to the west coast we drove to the Punakaiki Pancake Rocks. The rain finally stopped by then so we were enjoying being outside. The pancake rocks were really beautiful and unique looking. After spending the evening in a small town called Hokitika, we camped near Lake Mahinapua. Our next adventure was conquering Franz Josef and Fox Glaciers. But before we went there we stopped at Lake Mapourika, which was gorgeous!!!





Franz Josef and Fox are the most accessible glaciers in New Zealand and have hiking tracks that bring you right to the face of the glacier. After walking to Franz Josef we decided to relax for a while in the famous Glacier Hot Pools, which is basically just really hot swimming pools enclosed in a rainforest setting. Since it is so cold most of the time, we enjoyed some must-needed warmth. We also did a guided hike on Fox Glacier, which allowed us to walk on top of the glacier. It was a tough hike, but definitely worth it. The views were amazing!



Although the places we went were so beautiful and fun, some of the best times of the trip was when we were just hanging out at our campsite talking and cooking dinner. We had some great meals throughout our trip like rice and hot dogs, pasta with marinara sauce, and rice with beans. It was definitely a culinary adventure. Also, it was always an interesting challenge to cook dinner, organize the campervans, and get ready for bed in the dark. But it was all part of the fun!