South to Southern Alps

Today was a long travel day. We had to drive from Nelson in the north of South Island of New Zealand to Franz Josef, about half-way down the west coast.

We had an early breakfast and were on the road by 8.15am. A few coffee stops were needed to keep us going but the weather was good. After Greymouth we stopped in Horitika. I had no idea what to expect as this was an impromptu stop. Heading straight for the beach I was greeted by the usual grey sand, pretty close to 18% grey by my reckoning! I found some tree stumps and with waves crashing in the background and a low viewpoint ran off a couple of films. These were the only films of the day; we arrived in Franz Josef by 4pm with clouds well down on the tops.

Forecast is for reasonable weather to start with but deteriorating to rain by evening. We are planning to walk Alex Knob for views of glaciers and big mountains. This is about 1200m of ascent and will take about 8 hours. Hope the weather holds