The Saxtons vs. The Stars

It's our anniversary this weekend (14 years baby!) and we wanted to do something a little romantic and fun to celebrate. One of things I have wanted to do for a while is go to Mt. Cook. Every time we have driven by the Southern Alps it has been overcast and we haven't had a good view of Mt. Cook, which is the tallest peak in the range. 

I did some research and found a fun package at The Hermitage, a well-known hotel at the foot of Mt. Cook. We booked the 'Stay and Gaze' package, which included the Big Sky Stargazing tour and a pass to the Sir Edmund Hillary Alpine Centre. (For those of you who don't know, Sir Edmund Hillary was in the first team of mountain climbers to reach the summit of Mount Everest.) 

Needless to say, the stargazing tour got us really excited because the area around Mount Cook is one of the only International Dark Sky Reserves in the world. This means that the sky here doesn't have the "light pollution" that cities do and you can actually see many more stars than in other areas due to the darkness of the sky.

Our journey started early Friday afternoon and to our delight, one of the radio stations was playing the top 90 of the 90s on the radio. So we got to spend the first couple of hours reminiscing some of our favorite songs from our adolescence. It was awesome! However, our good moods were tempered a bit as we got closer to the Southern Alps and dark clouds were hanging low. By the time we arrived at The Hermitage, it was raining. Our stargazing experience was in serious jeopardy.

We checked in and made a reservation for dinner. We had a very nice buffet that covered both traditional kiwi foods (think lamb, pork, roast veggies, etc.) and Japanese foods (sushi, mussels, and some other things I didn't recognize). It was a very good meal. As we looked out the window, we noticed that snow had started to fall. 

I went outside and took this picture. No, those aren't stars in the dark sky, those are snowflakes! The flash on the camera made it look pretty darn close to a night sky though.

Shortly after dinner, we reported for the stargazing tour. The tour started off with an orientation of sorts in the planetarium, which lasted about 45 minutes. It was okay, but the guide was a little dry. Brian really didn't like that he kept referring to different aspects of the universe as "stuff". Like the rings around Saturn are made of "stuff". Unfortunately, the storm persisted and we didn't get to observe any of the stars we had just learned about for ourselves.

The good thing is that I'm pretty sure we will now be able to locate both the Scorpio and Southern Cross constellations, so that's a plus. With the disappointment of the evening, we decided to call it a night and hope for some excitement tomorrow.

The purpose of this picture is to show the snow on top of the car. It's about 11:00am so it had already started to melt, but this was the only time in the 20 months we've been here that our car has had snow on it haha.

Saturday morning we started off with a very yummy breakfast in the buffet restaurant again. At least the food here was excellent! We then watched the 3D movie about Mt. Cook in the Sir Edmund Hillary Alpine Centre. The movie covered the Maori history of Mt. Cook (the Maori name is Aoraki) and then showed some aerial views of the Southern Alps. We really enjoyed the part about the legend of Aoraki so I'll share it with you as well!

The legend of Aoraki/Mount Cook comes from the Maori tribe, Ngai Tahu, and is the story of Aoraki and his three brothers. They were the sons of Rakinui (the Sky Father) and they were on a voyage around Papa-ti-a-nuku (the Earth Mother) when they were caught in a big storm and their canoe became stranded upon a reef.

Aoraki, his brothers, and their crew climbed on to the top side of the canoe but the south wind froze them and turned them into stone. Their canoe became New Zealand's South island (Te Waka o Aoraki is the oldest name for the South island). Aoraki who, was the tallest of the brothers, is now seen as the majestic Aoraki/Mount Cook (which is the tallest peak) with the Souther Alps as his brothers and other members of their crew.

After the movie we decided to take a little drive over to see the Tasman Glacier based on a recommendation from a work friend. It wasn't too far away, but we had to hike about 25 minutes each way to get to the Tasman Lake, which the glacier melts/runs into. Here's a couple pics we took along the way.

Brian refused to look at me for this picture!!!

At least we could actually see the peak of Aoraki/Mt. Cook today!

It was quite cold as we started out on our walk and there was a decent breeze hitting us once we reached the lake, but the clouds started to dissipate and it gradually got warmer. One of the reasons for taking the trail to the lake was that we had heard pieces of the glacier sometimes break off as little icebergs in the lake and when they get turned over they are a really pretty blue. We were out of luck again as there were only a couple of dingy icebergs floating in the lake.

We did get some really great pictures of the scenery though. And apparently I have a fascination with clouds, because some of my favorite outdoor pictures are the ones where the clouds are doing something interesting.

This picture looks behind us away from the glacier where you can see the valley cut by the glacier and the debris it left behind over thousands of years.

Brian is "crying" in this picture. He says it's because the wind was hurting his eyes, but I think it's because he knew we still had to hike back to the car hehe

Tasman Lake - with no icebergs...

We made the trek back to the car. But I didn't want the trip to be a total bust so I decided I wanted to hike the other trail. Brian was too tired, so I made the trip on my own to the Blue Lakes and a view of the Tasman Glacier. What a hike!

I took a picture of part of the trail I hiked up so you could see how steep it was!

My first stop was a vantage point of the Blue Lakes. I tried to get all three little lakes in this picture below. I've also included the explanation of how they got their color (because I think it's interesting).

I finished hiking to the top of the ridge and was rewarded with some gorgeous views.

Wide view of the glacier and Southern Alps. Mt. Cook is the peak on the far left.

So the Tasman Glacier is in the valley emptying into Tasman Lake

Up close and personal with the Tasman Glacier - if I didn't know otherwise I wouldn't have guessed it was solid ice

I also got a pretty nice shot of the summit of Aoraki/Mt. Cook while I was up here on this little ridge. Can I just point out the mostly blue sky? Why couldn't it be clear 16 hours earlier!!!?

Haha - since I was by myself, I tried to take a selfie with my big camera. It didn't really work...

After I slowly made my way back down to the car, we decided to start heading back towards home. The drive was beautiful, especially going past Lake Pukaki. The water was such a beautiful turquoise blue it could have passed for the ocean. We stopped at an overlook and took a couple more pictures to finish off the day.

Did I mention Ike came on this trip with us? We had to leave him in the car for most of it because he's not allowed in the national parks, but we were glad he was with us for the 4 1/2 hour drive each way!

One more view of the majestic Aoraki/Mt. Cook. This view did it way more justice than the others when we were closer.

That's all for this trip folks! Luckily the trip wasn't a total bust and we saw some pretty amazing things. But I'll always be sad we missed our stargazing tour...

Happy 14th Anniversary to us!