Day 42: Aoraki (Mount Cook)

Stunning scenes of lakes, mountain, rivers, glaciers, and icebergs

Tasman Lake and Tasman Glacier surrounded by the mountains in Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park — All photos taken by Dan Harris

Things all seemed to happen quite quickly between Lake Tekapo and Mount Cook. As our time in New Zealand is coming to a close, we started advertising to sell our van for when we’re in Christchurch. We had a response pretty quickly, but they were in a hurry to start their travels as soon as possible, so we changed our plans a bit at the last minute. This meant that our night in the van next to that incredibly blue canal was actually our last night!

We booked to stay at an Airbnb in Christchurch so we could keep the van in a saleable state. This meant that all of a sudden, we found ourselves cooking our last meal in the van and spending our last proper day travelling in it too.

The drive to Mount Cook was another great one. We drove alongside the massive — and unbelievably blue — Lake Pukaki, surrounded on all sides by the Southern Alps.

On arrival, we took a brief look around the visitor centre after getting some advice on the walks we should spend our day doing. There was a tonne of information at the visitor centre, but we didn’t stay for long as we still had to drive for four and a half hours to Christchurch that evening, as well as see everything that we wanted to see in Mount Cook.

Inside the visitor centre at Mount Cook

Unfortunately, it was a very overcast day so our chances of being able to see the top of Mount Cook were slim. On the other hand, it was a great temperature for walking in and the landscape was still incredible.

The first walk we did was along the Hooker Valley. The walk lasted a few hours but it was pretty easy in terms of terrain. It had three swing bridges, lakes, rivers, mountains, and icebergs, and the walk took us through a valley that had been carved out by a glacier over thousands of years. Pretty cool.

One of the swing bridges along the walk

Reflective alpine tarn — pond — just off the track

There were quite a few sections where large landslides had occurred

At the end of the walk, we would have been able to see Mount Cook — known in Te Reo as Aoraki — towering over the lake and the glacier if the skies were clearer. As it was, we had to settle for a slightly less impressive, but still pretty amazing view of the glacier, lake, and icebergs. Besides, we think the clouds made the whole place that bit more atmospheric.

The glacier is actually at the back of the lake on the right of this photo but it’s covered in rocks so it’s hard to see

Despite the clouds hiding the mountains, the views were still pretty great

After finishing the Hooker Valley Walk, we grabbed some lunch before moving on again to our second — much shorter — walk.

We parked up at a different carpark and spent a good fifteen minutes walking up steps to reach the Tasman Glacier Viewpoint. What a view it was…

Aoraki/Mount Cook was hidden behind the clouds on the left

There were a couple of small boats out on the lake which really put into perspective just how big these icebergs were. Even the smallest icebergs were bigger than the boat and its passengers.

The ice mixes with the ground-up rock to give the icebergs their colour

Looking in the other direction, this viewpoint gave us an even better idea of where the glacier used to be. Bounded on either side by the mountains, the glacier would have carved out the valley that is now devoid of ice.

The lake in the bottom right corner is called Blue Lake — yes, it’s now green, but it used to be blue

All of the rocks and boulders were left behind when the head of the glacier melted and retreated which is why the landscape looks like it does.

Finally, with the day moving on, we said goodbye to Aoraki and started the long journey across to Christchurch. The weather began to clear up ever so slightly so I managed to get a photo of the top of Mount Cook before we got too far out of range.

It’s not so impressive from such a long distance with just my phone camera, but at least we saw it before we left

We found out en-route that the guy who was interested in the van was no longer interested. It would have been nice to know before I told him we were on our way but I did manage to guilt-trip him enough to get an apology.

The drive was a long one so we stopped once again to grab a Domino’s to save having to cook once we arrived. Unfortunately, the weather on the other side of the mountain range was pretty bad and so we arrived in Christchurch in the rain. Oh well, at least we had a bed in an actual house with an actual hot shower waiting for us.