We left the beautiful Garden city of Christchurch not very early, changed some $ in a bank, where the clerk woman was super pleasant. ￂﾠWaked for the last time through the painful but very nice city center and off we went. 310km ￂﾠto Twizel, which is close to Lake Pukaki ￂﾠ-it took us 6 hours to drive…The road was supposed to be Scenic, which it was in parts. So we stopped ant took some pictures, didn’t hike. The weather was sunny at times and very cloudy in between. In fact, by the end of our drive the clouds were floating so low by the ground and we were not super high – maybe some 500 m above sea level. The rivers we crossed were of unnaturally blueish-greenish color, very bright and the reason is ￂﾠ- they are from glacier water. When the sun shines- ￂﾠit is nice and warm, but when it hides- ￂﾠ a jacket is a must. especially with the winds that we are experiencing here for the third day. Locals say they haven’t had such winds since 2 months ago. but boy, they are strong…We couldn’t enjoy Lake Tekapo at all – the lake is so beautiful from the car windows, but once we got out- ￂﾠwe just wanted to go back and hide…So therefore- ￂﾠno hiking today.
Here is Lake Tekapo and the little church in front of it, and me in front of the church with my hair flying in the wind:
The clouds were just crawling through the mountains like some big tidal waves:
Mt Cook is seen in the middle on the other side of Lake Pukaki. We will try to come closer to it tomorrow.