Janessa's Adventures Abroad: No Pants, No Problem! South Island Trip Part 2...

So we left Queenstown early Friday morning and made our way to Franz Josef. We got settled in our hostel and then headed over to the main office for our hiking tour of the Franz Josef glacier. First of all, they say glacier funny. They pronounce it like glay-see-er. Weird right? Second of all, we got some really awesome hiking boots that made us all look super attractive. Hahaha, so we headed out to the glacier. We walked through a temperate rainforest first for a little bit which was pretty cool. Then we walked through the valley by the glacier. It was so pretty! There were waterfalls and really sweet rocks everywhere. We got to a certain point that was pretty close to the glacier and it was all roped off. At first, we were all confused because we thought that was the end of the hike and if it was the end, then that was a lame hike. But then they lifted up the rope and we all trekked through the danger zone right up to the glacier. It was sweet! We heard some ice break off of the glacier where it was melting and it echoed through the little ice cave it was forming. It was so loud but when we looked, it was only a few soft ball sized pieces. Crazy! Then we took a break and some of us went up and licked the glacier (don’t worry, we cleaned it off with some water first). It was pretty cool and so pretty. We took tons of pictures! Then with our wristband from our hike, we got free entry into the glacier hot pools. It felt so good! The pools are full of heated glacier water so it doesn’t smell like sulfur which is awesome. There were 3 pools with different temperatures so we started with the coolest and made our way up to the warmest. The whole place is just right in the middle of the forest so it feels really relaxing and tropical. It was so cool. On Saturday we did some more driving (surprise, surprise!). We stopped in this little town and did some shopping and got lunch. It was so cute! Then after a few more hours of driving we made it to the pancake rocks. We went to our hostel first and got settled in. So we were expecting a normal hostel that we had rented out all the beds in but when we got there the lady said we had to park and hike up to our lodge. Hahaha, so we start trekking through the forest and it was only a few minute walk but it felt like we were in the middle of nowhere. Our lodge was adorable though! It was this cute little cabin and in the lounge there was a record player and a ton of records so of course I spent most of the night going through them. It was awesome! We went out and saw the pancake rocks for a little bit, too. It’s hard to describe them but they kind of look like a stack of pancakes and when the tide is in, the water shoot us kind of like a geyser. It was pretty cool. We went down to the beach for awhile, too. It was cool because the sand was just a lot of really small, smooth rocks. So of course we all filled our pockets with them. Haha, they were so cool! Today we drove about an hour out to the church building for a little branch in the next city. We basically took over Sacrament Meeting. I contributed by playing the piano for the hymns and for our musical number. We sang Nearer My God to Thee and I made up an accompaniment part. I hope it sounded ok! Then they had a whole luncheon for us and we got to know some of the members. It was so fun. Then we drove out to our hostel right outside of Abel Tasman National Park. We are spending the night here and then tomorrow we are embarking on an adventure, completely outside of my comfort zone, in the park. Hopefully I make it back alive!