At Mount Cook

In our previous visits, we always lacked the time to approach Mt.Cook (the highest mountain in New Zealand with 3724m) from the east side - it always 'only' remained a flyover. This time we had a bit more time, so we wanted to go hiking here as well. We took the opportunity and didn't take the shortest route, but a larger detour through Central Otago and over the Lindis Pass - both not in the top category of highlights, but definitely worth a visit.

All our sources agreed - the Hooker Valley Track is the must-do hike east of Mount Cook, and although we had planned 3 days in the region, it was supposed to rain on two of them (and it did), so we scheduled this hike on the sunny day - a wise decision, because the views of Mount Cook and the surrounding mountains and glaciers certainly impressed us. But three hours were a bit too short for us, so we also added the Kea Point Track (another hour, unfortunately no keas). And since the day wasn't over yet, we also asked for our usual flight. The last flight was just being loaded, but the company quickly added one last flight for us, which we had all to ourselves.

The next day, we had also tried a 'Tasman Glacier Viewpoint', but the view was already poor, and just as we started walking, the continuous rain began - we hid in our accommodation for half a day. At night, the rain briefly stopped and instead a clear starry sky became visible, with the Milky Way clearly visible. We were thrilled. But then the weather brought more rain, which lasted until noon the next day. After that, we wanted to go hiking again, but instead of rain, there were now stormy winds and single-digit temperatures as motivation brakes - after about 2 hours, day 3 was over with walking. By the way, there was fresh snow in the surrounding mountains on this day - and we actually thought we were on a summer vacation.

Because we didn't find any accommodation in Mount Cook Village, we had to travel about 60km every day. This led along Lake Pukaki, which delighted us with new beautiful colors every time we passed by ... so far, we might have done it a bit wrong by calling it the less attractive sibling of Lake Tekapo.

On the day of departure, we once again didn't take the shortest route to the next point of interest, but a detour that took us past Lake Tekapo ... which was, of course, - now wrapped in sunshine again - also very beautiful, but overall this time Lake Pukaki actually won the beauty contest.