I Peed on Fox Glacier

We drove though the night yet again, heading towards Fox Glacier. We had booked tours, each of us doing different things: Alex, Jamie, and Ben challenged themselves with ice climbing, Derek and I chose a full day hike, and Becky, Allen, and Ralph decided to sleep in and do the afternoon half day hike.

The people we booked the tours with provided shoes and anything else a person would need. I had bought a hat and gloves already, so I borrowed a waterproof jacket that I didn't use anyway. The hike was absolutely gorgeous. We began by trying water that had melted directly off of the glacier (about 2 degrees Celsius and the most refreshing water I have ever had), then tramped up a waterfall to reach the actual path. As my guide put it, "We're taking a shortcut which might not really be a shortcut...now you can appreciate the paths that we've made for you!"

The heights didn't bother me except for when we had to climb around a narrow part, gripping onto a chain provided in case our feet slipped. After we made it through, this annoying Canadian kid said, "You were holding onto that chain for dear life!" (I remember he was Canadian because he had a flag pin on his hat.) Once we were on the glacier, however, I was very content to walk around, exploring all of the caves that our guide showed us. We stopped and ate lunch, took a lot of pictures, and decided that the glacier valley looked like the Valley from the Land Before Time, the children's movie about the young dinosaurs who need to find their parents. One of the highlights, however, was after lunch, when nature started calling...our guide found a good spot behind a piece of ice and we took turns urinating. After the fourth person left, she said, "I've come up with a new money-making scheme. I'm going to sell t-shirts that say 'I've peed on Fox Glacier.' Would you buy one?" We all said yes, though I doubt I would have.

After coming down from the glacier and taking way too many pictures of the same things from different angles, the eight of us met up and decided to have a bonfire. We had all of the wood and food from the Moke Lake fiasco that still needed to be used. We drove out to the beach (about a half hour away from the town of Fox Glacier), dragged our stuff the ten-minute walk, and enjoyed the beach. We lit some coals to cook on and a huge driftwood stump as the fire to sit around. Some German tourists stopped by and we sat chatting late into the night, until we all started falling asleep. The Germans decided that we were boring and headed off.

We decided to stay the night in the vans at the beach and drive in the morning to the meeting point for our white water rafting trip. Ben and I volunteered to drive, meaning that we had to wake up an hour and a half earlier than everyone else. I set my alarm and somehow achieved waking up to it, knocked on Ben's door, and we headed out. The vans, unfortunately, were low on diesel--Team Efficient was on E as we drove towards Fox Glacier. Ben and I had already decided to stop to get gas, so we pulled in at 7:40 AM to the one station in Fox Glacier. However, it didn't open until 8, so, worried that we were going to miss our 9 AM pickup, we waited. Finally it opened; we filled the tanks and sped off like bloated speed demons (hey, these camper vans have a hard time going quickly).

We were going to be picked up by helicopter down a small road, the location of which was described as "before the Wanaka River." Ben, in the smaller and quicker Team Competence, had left my sight long before, and I was nervous I had missed the turn. I called back to everyone to wake them up when I guessed that we had about a half hour until we found the turn and kept driving until I saw the raging river ahead of us. Across the bridge, I saw Team Competence perpendicular to the road, its back wheels in a ditch, its front on the paved asphalt, and the guys milling about aimlessly. Ben had missed the road and tried to make a quick turn, instead getting the van stuck in the mud.

I pulled over, threw on the hazard lights, and everyone in Team Efficient got out to see what we could do. Someone had stopped to help; he had a hitch so that he could help drag us out, but no rope or chain to drag with. We scoured the vans for something that could work as Ben called AA, the company who was supposed to help us (and had when our battery died that first morning). Turns out that where we were was too remote, so we would have had to call a tow truck in the nearest town and paid for it ourselves. There was nothing tow-worthy in the vans. As we contemplated what to do (and prayed that we hadn’t missed the helicopter yet), another person stopped to help. Luckily, they had something strong enough to pull our mighty van out of the ditch. After a chorus of “Thank you!!”s, we all jumped into our respective vehicles. Our vans turned around in a driveway up ahead and sped down the road.

Let’s hope we made it in time for the helicopters…