The alarm went off at 6.15am and for a split second we thought we were back at home and getting up for work. We hadn’t seen this time of the morning for nearly 2 weeks. Thankfully, it was for something much more enticing – our first ever train trip in NZ.
The Tranz-Alpine train runs from Christchurch on the east coast of the South Island to Greymouth on the west coast and takes around 4.5 hours. You travel over the Canterbury plains towards the Southern Alps, which are the meeting point for the huge Pacific and Australian tectonic plates and backbone of the south island. You then ascend up to Arthur’s Pass and travel through the 8.5km Opito tunnel (I’ll be putting on a short post about that) which brings you out on the west side of the Alps.
Although there was some low cloud around the higher ground, we did have a beautiful sunny day and the train had an outdoor carriage, perfect for photos and video (which will follow soon).
It was such a scenic and relaxing trip that when we arrived in Greymouth we would have been happy to just chill out in the sun and have a wander around. However, we only had 45 minutes before catching our coach to Franz Josef, a town in the glacier region of the South Island.
Three and a half hours, 3 comfort stops (1 unscheduled) and some windy roads later we arrived in Franz Josef. We had 30 minutes to settle into our room at the Scenic Hotel (lovely place and we got a free upgrade!) before going on a walk of the glacier valley.
We sat on the bed, looked at each other’s slightly green-tinged faces (thanks to the windy roads) and decided that we would cancel the walk. It was 5.15pm, we’d been travelling all day, felt travel sick and just wanted to relax.
Luckily, we’ve visited Franz Josef twice before, so we’ve seen the glacier from the bottom and have also taken a helicopter ride to the top, so didn’t feel we were missing out on too much. It was also another 7.30am start the next day (shock, horror!), so we decided on an early night.
4 hours later we were sat in the Blue Ice Bar drinking vodka red bull. Oops.