Day 20: (Not) trotting like a fox

Yay, more rain!
It might sound a little boring, but there it is. Consecutive day of rain número 10 has started, and we do not like it.
Also, the people at Fox Glacier Guiding don’t like this amount of rain and have cancelled all tours which are going onto the glacier itself.
Instead, they are offering a walk to the Glacier Terminal Face, which is the end of the glacier itself. You’ll be able to walk to it and check out the awesomeness of the icy highway from a small distance, while standing in the rain.
We opted not to do this instead of our own tour, and received a form for refunding of the tour.

Ok. Our daytime activities are now limited to virtually nothing. Everything here is outdoors, and usually takes longer than a few hours.
We don’t like getting soaked, which leaves only a very few activities.
As the rain lifted a little bit, we decided to ignore the weather and walk around Lake Matheson. Being really nearby and with a total time outdoors of about 90 minutes, we figured it would be ok.
And, we also borrowed a big umbrella each from the Lodge, to ensure we’d stay dry.

The walk is really nice, and we were lucky enough to stay mostly dry! We did not however see the surrounding mountains, as the clouds were hanging too low. After this, we drove to the face of the glacier ourselves.
The guided tour takes you to about 100 metres from the glacier, while the general public is only allowed at about 600 metres distance. The difference is negligible, especially under these conditions as the majority of the glacier and mountains are covered by clouds.
This walk also is lovely, and should be repeated with better weather!

After our dinner, we looked up and spotted two things: no rain, and the clouds had lifted just enough to show the snowy caps of Mount Cook and the glacier in its entirety!
Like madmen, we drove to Lake Matheson, and I even ran to a vista point called Reflection Point. This lookout shows the high mountains and sometimes their reflections in Lake Matheson. The stuff postcards are made from!
The pictures are good, but I was a little late to the party as the clouds already started rolling in from the left. The views are still great though!

Tomorrow, we leave this place already and head for Wanaka. We are too afraid to check the weather reports, so we’ll let faith decide for us.