Franz Josef glacier + incapacitatedness

Since my last post we've climbed a glacier...Franz Josef. Six hours of climbing...it was definitely the most strenuous thing we've done, and also one of the highlights of the trip (the whole of NZ is the highlight: I LOVE this country).

We opted for the full day trek over the glacier, which was recommended as the best way of seeing the prettier parts whilst being cheaper than the helicopter-trip option, and set off at 8am (after the worst night's sleep ever: 6 girls, some of whom totally snored and/or sleep talked, in a tiny dormitory the size of, like, something small) with a really cute guide called Cliff who was a bit of a hippy (he was a fan of the "nappy-free baby", so I told him I had a cousin who practised that...wonder how it worked out). We'd put ourselves into the self-selecting "more confident" group for no obvious reason as we weren't particularly confident, but hey. They did really work us, and expected alot in the way of confidence and just strength, but we managed not to actually disgrace ourselves.

The first couple of hours, getting up the initial slopes to the top of the glacier, were the hardest. The scenery went from a flat, stoney valley, through steep rocky areas, to steep, rocky, icy but very dirty areas, until you got higher up where the muckiness eased off and the ice was just dazzling. We had kind of mini-crampons on our boots, which gave us amazing grip on the ice, and alot of the steepest parts had steps carved in the ice by our guide using a pick-axe type thing, and there'd be the occasional rope to hang on to...apparently Franz-Josef is the steepest commercially guided glacier.

Once we got to the top the ice was fabulous, with that amazing blue colour that you see in pictures. We spent the time climbing around, often through these really narrow crevasses - our guide checked that none of us were claustrophobic before, which none of us took very seriously until we were sliding through these cracks between towering walls of ice, sometimes so narrow that you had to turn sideways and shuffle your feet along! At least in the crevasses you were less scared of falling or slipping as you could wedge yourself in by the elbows.



It was so wet up there - alot less cold and frozen than I expected: there was constant dripping, and there'd be little waterfalls coming out through gaps in the ice and pools of icy water - sometimes deep enough that you were scared of falling in them. There were also strange muddy areas, where all of a sudden it would seem like you were walking on rock instead of ice, but a bit of poking around revealed that there was still ice underneath. The ice formations were just so amazing...it looked really active, like waves frozen in motion.

So, a fantastic day, which did, sadly, totally mess us up. We woke up next day with a really bad cold (me) and swollen knees (Vic). Those people who know Vic know that she's always had trouble with her knees...well, all the climbing was too much for them apparently, so now they've swollen up and she's very stiff and actually paid to see a doctor yesterday, who said that it was just too much impact for the joints to handle and that she should see a physiotherapist and try to modify the way she walks...hmm. He also suggested that she "might want to consider walking with a stick".

Eeek. I laughed alot when she told me that. So did she, I hope it was genuine and that she's not secretly really upset. I want us to find her a really classic walking stick that she can do fun dances with, but I don't think she's convinced. Apparently the doctor said, by way of encouragement, "I walk with a stick".

It's like, yeah, but you're an old man, right?!

Anyway, hopefully she'll feel better after resting for a few days. At the moment she's just walking very slowly and going downstairs is difficult. Meanwhile, I came down with this awful rotten cold and have been in bed for pretty much the whole of the last day and a half. We're in a really beautiful town by a lake in the mountains called Wanaka, and we've extended our stay here so that we leave tomorrow in order to have today to recuperate. Some very cool people from our tour have stayed on too, and they're all going out tonight, which is lame as I'm going to have to go to bed at about 8pm...so ill...grrr.

More photos at www.photobucket.com under victorialouise, and at www.getjealous.com/vicandmary.