Franz Josef Glacier - Hokitika - Arthur's Pass - Christchurch

At Franz Josef Glacier, we only made a short detour to Sentinel Rock and River & Glacier Viewpoint (two viewpoints), instead of hiking the Alex Knob Track, which apparently takes 8 hours round trip. Although the view from the summit of Alex Knob is said to be better, offering a great perspective of the glacier, unfortunately, the Franz Josef Glacier was quite clouded over, and even a better angle wouldn't have changed the view much. A much better weather with plenty of sunshine and few clouds was forecasted for the next day, but Markus had to be back in Christchurch to catch his flight to Germany.

Therefore, we drove along the coast to Hokitika, where we touristically (unsuccessfully) looked for a jade souvenir and took a little stroll on the beach. I would have liked to visit Glowworm Dell after sunset, but it made more sense to drive a bit further towards Christchurch to have less stress the next day. So we drove over Arthur's Pass and found a really nice spot for the night in a valley as it was getting dark.

And then it was already here: Markus's departure day - luckily we only needed to be at the airport around 3 PM. Therefore, we had time on the way to Christchurch to explore Cave Stream a bit. This is a cave about 1 km long, through which a stream flows, and at the end, there is said to be a waterfall. Both the travel guide and the signs from the DOC explicitly warn not to enter alone, each person should carry two flashlights and ideally wear a wetsuit. Apparently, people have died from hypothermia in Cave Stream because it's cold throughout the cave, and the temperature of the water can be close to freezing depending on the season.

Although there were two of us and each of us had two flashlights, we didn't have wetsuits. Nevertheless, we went inside quite a bit and quickly understood the warnings: it was pitch dark after just 20m. If we had only had one flashlight and it had failed, quite literally, we wouldn't have seen our hand in front of our eyes, and finding the way back would have been difficult. Besides, it got pretty chilly, and the water was really cold. There is no GPS signal in the cave, but I estimate we went about 100m in before I had enough. But it was cool to experience that!

When we arrived in Christchurch, we still had just under three hours before we needed to head to the airport. I showed Markus some sights in the city center, one of which was the Margarete Mahy Family Playground, which was new to me. My tour guide Kim had talked about this playground two weeks ago because after many collapsed or unstable buildings were demolished following the earthquakes, there was an open space for a playground. The special thing about this playground is that it was designed by children. A really great idea and very well implemented.

We then drove to the airport, Markus packed his last things, and then our paths parted once again...