New Zealand - Mount Cook National Park

We arrived in the Mount Cook Natiional Park and couldn't see any mountains at all, after 100m up, so went to see the Tasman Glacier instead.  This is named after Abel Tasman, who was the first European to see Mount Cook in 1642, a 130 years before Captain Cook

Not that you can see the Tasman Glacier, as it's underwater here.  It's apparently 600m high to the left side and 200m high to the right side

The whole area here was carved out by massive glaciers in the past.  Although you don't think of glaciers as moving too fast, one year some people died whilst out in the snow and the year after the next thaw, a body of one of the victims was found, over 2km away!

You can take boat trips out on the glacier, brrr, no thanks

We camped over and the next day, the cloud broke and we could see Mount Cook peaking up through them

Mount Cook was called so, not by Captain Cook, who never saw it, but by Captain Stokes, who surveyed the islands 80 years later in 1851

This is taken at one end of Lake Pukaki, by which the road into the park runs

Of course, before it was named by Captain Stokes, it already had a name, given by the locals, Ngāi Tahu.  It was Aoraki, which meant 'Cloud Piercer'

Once the clouds go, there's an amazing sight whichever way you look

And up close, it's awesome

It's around 3754m high and is the tallest mountain in Australia and New Zealand

It's part of the Southern Alps, which divide east from west, running down the south island of New Zealand.  It's there due to the Pacific plate moving against the Indo-Australian plate

As you get closer to Mount Cook, you see that the surrounding mountains aren't as small as they look from a distance

I thought Paul was joking when he said, look at the climbers

And to think he struggles with bus numbers...

It made me feel very small, stood there looking around

The road only goes so far and we didn't fancy trying to climb it.....

...but fortunately there's a short walk to get a little nearer to it

This is from the side of another glacier

And you could hear the constant crack of the snow of this mountain, with rumbles as it falls down the mountain

The campsite we were at was pretty.  And before long it was afternoon brew time

And some of the strangest coloured ducks came over for crumbs

Not sure which is male and female though