The next morning we woke up in Queenstown and were able to actually see the town in the daylight for once. We had a beautiful view of Lake Wakatipu and the surrounding mountains from our apartment. There was also the most incredible sunrise I have ever seen. The sky and clouds were all bright pink and orange as the sun was coming up and we all got some great pictures and were able to watch the sky while eating breakfast.
Queenstown sunrise
Then, we got on the road and headed out towards the west coast. We went through Haast Pass, one of the three ways to cross through the Southern Alps, and stopped at the Blue Pools. There, we only had to walk a short distance to a bridge over a river running into a pool that had such clear blue water. It was so bright and looked beautiful, even on this cloudy day. I’m sure it was really cold, but if it was warmer out it would have been tempting to swim. On the bank of the pool there were lots of smooth, flat rocks, and people had stacked them into little piles. We decided to make one of our own before heading out and continuing on our journey.
Our next stop was at Fox Glacier. We followed the directions from the guide book, but the walk we planned to do was closed, so we had to do a much shorter version to a lookout. From there, we could see the glacier, but in my opinion it was a bit underwhelming. It was pretty amazing that we were walking through a rainforest with tropical plants and everything, and still able to see snow capped mountains and a glacier, though.
Fox Glacier
After this walk, we drove over to Lake Matheson to see that before the sun was setting. This is a lake that is known for being a perfectly smooth surface that has an amazing reflection of Mount Cook and Mount Tasman. Mount Cook is the tallest mountain in New Zealand, and last time I was somewhere where I could have seen it, it was too foggy. We walked the loop track around the lake and took some great photos.
Then, we were all happy to go check into our motel and get some dinner in the small town by Fox Glacier. After dinner, I wanted to go check out the Minnehaha Walk through the forest where I heard you can see glow worms. It was only a twenty minute walk, but in the dark it was a bit scary. We didn’t want too much light so we could see the glow worms but Mom and Lindsey led the way with a flash light and soon enough we did see many glow worms on the trees all around the path. It was a pretty cool to see them, although I think everyone was happy to get back out of the dark forest.
Hammond Adventures 