Snow in July.

On Saturday I got up bright and early and caught the ferry from Wellington over to Picton on the south island. It was a 3 hour journey and I spent most of the time in a comfy seat trying to get some sleep. As the ferry got closer to Picton we traveled down the fjord (or fiord as they spell it over here) It was a beautiful view.

After waiting for what felt like forever for my bag to arrive (we had to check them in like you do at the airport), I finally got on the bus and we headed down to Nelson. Once checked in to the hostel a group of us took a hike up to the centre of New Zealand.

Apparently Nelson is the sunniest place in New Zealand and so far we've been lucky to have sun every day. Not seen any rain since the north island! Touch wood. We left Nelson for Westport. On the way we stopped off at Nelson Lakes and took a walk in the reserve up there. We had a picnic lunch by the lake (in the snow) and watched as a group from the boat decided to jump into the lake.

When we got to Westport a lot of people had gone to do the jet boating activity. Me and Ailin decided to take a walk to the beach in an attempt to see the sunset. The trip failed when the sun went behind the cloud, never to be seen again. So we walked back to the hostel (it took about 40minutes each way) and tried not to get run over by any of the boy racers.

The next morning we took a walk along the coast. It was like walking along the coast in England. All that was missing was a bit of rain. We did see seals though which is not something we see often back home. We also stopped off at Pancake Rocks to try and see the blow holes but we didn't see any water getting blown up...

We headed over to Greymouth to do a bit of shopping before heading to Lake Mahinapua where we were having a fancy dress party, the theme for which was 'Bad Taste'. There were people dressed up as babies, prostitutes, rapists and just general bad clothes. I played it safe with an 80s look. You can't beat a bit of blue eye makeup for bad taste. It was such a random place. We were in the middle of nowhere, just staying at this pub by the state highway with just some cows and campers for company. As the night drew to an end a group of us decided to take a walk down to the lake to see some glow worms. They were just beautiful. They were like stars on the ground.

Today we arrived in Franz Josef. It's a beautiful place and tomorrow I'm going for hike up on the glacier. The drive up here has been a scenic drive and I'm loving the snow topped mountains!

Wish me luck for tomorrow!!