Day 79 (24 August): Walking on a Big Ice Cube

I went on a guided hike of the Franz Joseph Glacier today. The Franz Joseph Glacier is unique for two reasons: 1) it is the world's steepest commercially guided glacier and 2) it is the only glacier in the world to be surrounded by rainforest. (NZ's rainforests are temperate ones meaning they have lots of moss, unlike tropical ones.) After strapping some crampons to my feet and picking up and ice axe, the hike included climbing up some big ice falls across ladder bridges that spanned 150 deep crevices, and putting myself in some other rather precarious but exciting situations while seeing some amazing scenery up close.

Observations:
1) The town of Franz Joseph exists only so people can hike the glacier. Its kindof weird, but restaurants are only open when glacier hikes return and shut down after that crowd has left. Otherwise, its pretty much a ghost town with nothing else for about 100 km in either direction along the only road that goes up-and-down the Island's West Coast.
2) The glacier guide was complaining the whole day about how everything in NZ is being bought up by foreign companies, particularly Canadian ones which said owned the whole timber industry and were going after farming as well.