New Zealand - Franz Josef Glacier

From subtropical to glacial - New Zealand has it all.  Roughly halfway down the west coast of the South Island is Franz Josef Glacier.  An easy and pretty 30 minute hike takes you to the foot of the glacier, which pushes its way out of the majestic Southern Alps range.

The immense scale of the glacier (of which we only see the very bottom) is not apparent even when standing at the base looking up.  It's only when you spot a group of people taking a guided tour onto the glacier that you realise how big it is.  Do you see them?  The first group is in the middle of the lower section of ice (roughly where the lower right Rule of Thirds lines cross) and the second, smaller group is further down, to the right.

Below we have a close up of the glacier.  The ice has cracked and formed crevasses under the immense pressure from further up.  What surprised me most was how astonishingly blue the ice is.

For more in the New Zealand series, click HERE