Ski Goddess Continues South

After the awesome day on Tasman Glacier, the next day was likely to be a bit of an anticlimax. It was time to move on south to the next ski field, this one not being on the Chill Pass, but still worthy of inclusion on the Ski Goddess' guide to the South Island.

Ohau ski field sits in a valley high up above the eponymous Lake, and had begun the season with a stonkingly huge snow fall which was now melting rapidly by the day. Warm days and cold nights was creating typical spring conditions, making early morning skiing more like ice skating. But once the sun softened the hard pack, it was a pleasant enough day, although avoiding rocks wasn't always possible. First task on arriving in Wanaka is to put the skis in for a little patching up!

Having heard so much about the Ohau Lodge I'd booked a night there, but in the less salubrious rooms where you need to provide your own sleeping bag. The view, the company, the delicious dinner and huge breakfast are well worth it. There's hot tubs as well. But what totally takes the cake is, ahem, the soap cake!

Due to the ski field conditions being pretty ordinary I decided not to spend a second day skiing, but headed off on a roundabout way of getting to Wanaka. Rather than head straight over the Lindis Pass to Tarras, I turned left at Omarama and headed for the coast.

The road skirts a couple more lakes before making its way down through farmland to Oamaru. This is a town known for its beautiful stone buildings, famous cheese factory and a penguin community. Somehow I missed the town completely, taking a more scenic approach road which joined the main highway just south of town. But my main object was to see the Moeraki Boulders, a bunch of large round pebbles on a beach nearby. Not really worth the detour unless low tide and the right light for a great photo, but nice to see a little ocean again after 2 weeks in the mountains.

At Palmerston I headed north again along the strangely named "Pigroot". This ascends into a tussock covered plateau surrounded by more snow covered peaks and scattered with small villages and pubs which service the Otago Central Rail Trail and possibly a few sheep farmers as well.

The Pigroot joins the main Queenstown to Dunedin road at Alexandra, where the road skirts yet another hydro lake or two before crossing the bridge at Cromwell and joining the Wanaka road. Half an hour later I am at my home away from home for the next 2 months: Wanaka Bakpaka. It's great to be back.

The skis get taken in for a full tune and I prepare for braving the school holiday crowds in the morning.....

A bucket list special from the top of NZ

Aoraki, or Mt Cook, is the tallest peak in NZ. It's smack bang in the middle of the South Island but only 30km from the West Coast. That means it's frequently buffeted by wind and weather from the west, making it hard to find a great day when the sun is out, the sky is blue and not a breeze to be felt. Well Friday was one such day.

Having received a less than optimistic phone call before sunup from the mountain guide at Mt Cook village, I took the plunge and drove down the highway on a hope and a prayer that the clouds from the overnight rain would disappear. Around Lake Pukaki it started to look promising....

The drive up towards Mt Cook skirts Lake Pukaki, yet another glacial lake used in the south island's network of hydroelectric dams and generators. The view is dominated by Aoraki towering up ahead as you wind up into glacier land. There's about 3 or 4 glaciers on this side of the divide: Tasman, Hooker, Kelman...., with Fox and Franz Joseph accessible from the west. But today, the action will be on Tasman Glacier, extending 14km before disappearing into a moraine lake.

We meet at Mt Cook airport. The sun is shining and there is no breeze. It's looking good! I meet the two other punters plus guides joining us, we don our avalanche transceivers and do a quick trial search before packing the ski plane with our gear and hitting the skies.

The point of a trip like this isn't so much the skiing as the scenery. The flight up the glacier, past Mt Cook and other towering peaks is just spectacular. The plane travels so close to the mountains you feel you could reach out and touch them. And then we land at the top of the glacier!

We unload and the plane takes off, then all is silence. Just majestic snow covered mountains, blue skies and an occasional roar from an avalanche. Nowhere near us though!

We click in to our skis and begin the descent of the glacier. It's pretty cruisy skiing through nice fresh snow, but lower down we are faced with rain soaked conditions which are less than ideal. Meanwhile, we visit weird ice formations, called seracs, and marvel at the beauty of mother nature.

The plane picks us up again and we take another scenic flight up to another section of the glacier for our second descent. After a lunch with a million dollar view, we visit some more ice formations, including making our way through an ice cave. The climb back out was a bit of an effort!

Finally we are back in the rain soaked terrain, and we crunch our way down to board the plane for our final scenic flight over the moraine lake at Tasman's base before landing back to the airport.

Gasoline can... or cordial??

What a day! Definitely worth every cent!

I've put together a video of the day. It's quite long, at 15min duration, but the scenery is just beautiful. You can view it by following this link.