New Zealand: Mt Cook, Rafting, and Christchurch

Our last three days in New Zealand seemed to contain the most driving.  We left Wanaka after breakfast to head up to Mt Cook for a day hike.  We heard that Tasman lake had icebergs in it so we had to go see.

Stop by Lake Pukaki.  Mt Cook is to the left.

One of the bridges on the path to Lake Tasman

Mt Sefton

This cloud hung around the top of Mt Cook all day keeping me from getting a perfect picture.

Made it to Lake Tasman.  The icebergs are chunks of the glacier that have broken off. 

See the edge of the iceberg at the end of the lake?  It is covered by till which makes it hard to see how big the Tasman
Glacier is. 

Up close of the edge of Tasman Glacier.  The till turns the lake this cloudy tan color.

Trying to get a picture with cloudy Mt Cook

A clear glacial stream

A resting point along the trail

 After the hike we headed to a B&B just outside of Twizel.  The B&B was located on a family farm and we had a spectacular view out the window of our room.  We ran into town for a bottle of wine and pizza which we enjoyed from these two chairs as we watched the sunset.  Definitely our favorite evening of the trip.

Peaceful

Sunset over Mt Cook

The next morning we headed to Geraldine to go rafting but there was some miscommunication and we missed our trip so we continued on to Christchurch to spend the day.  There wasn't much to do in Christchurch after the earthquake so all we did was go to Cashel Mall.  Cashel Mall is street shopping that was setup after the earthquake and vendors were not allowed to operate within the Red Zone.  The shops are in modified containers that they stacked and lined up along the street.

Derek and I studied the construction of these shops for quite some time.

The following day we were able to get spots on the rafting trip so we headed back to Geraldine for some rafting along the Rangitata Gorge.

Our rafting group.  We were with a group of European backpackers and our guide, Dan.

Heading down one of the first rapids, cheesing real hard.

First class 5 rapid 

Where did the boat go?

Probably screaming and choking on the river I just drank 

Beautiful Rangigata Gorge

About to disappear into another rapid

We made it through alive

At the end of the trip was Jump Rock where we leaped into the freezing cold water.  There were two different jumps and I only did the first one.  I didn't enjoy the long swim back to the shore in frigid glacial water.

Jump Rock

Here I go! 

About to hit the water

Derek's turn

Derek jumping from the higher point

Still falling....I think this was about a 15 meter drop.

We questioned taking the two hour drive back to Geraldine for rafting but it proved to be worth it and it was the perfect ending to our trip.  We are so thankful we got the opportunity to make this trip to New Zealand.  I hope we will get a chance to go back and see more of it before we move back to the States.  We still have half of the south island and all of the north island to see.  New Zealand is incredible!