Monday 23 April. Fox Glacier to Cape Foulwind

Farwell Fox Glacier

Drove up the west coast today through some amazing cold temperate rainforest along very windy roads that hug the coast.  I never realised NZ had this type of forest that just drips off sheer cliffs straight into the ocean.  It really was impossible to count the number of tree ferns and palms despite the max temp today to be 15 degrees.   Kept an eye out for my orca but none appeared.  David and I celebrated our 19^th wedding anniversary today – what a great way to spend it.  

We stopped at Hokitika, the Greenstone (Jade) capital of NZ. David bought me the most beautiful necklace made from local greenstone , he really opened the wallet wide today!  (amazingly, I think he actually enjoyed it – although he did manage to get a discount for cash!!!) The boys also bought themselves some necklaces carved from bone that of course , as legend has it, protect  the owner from evil and give them great magical powers. They were unstoppable!

We also stopped off to view the Pancake Rocks, they were actually really quite amazing.

  After a long day we arrived at the most amazing B&B, perched up on top of a cliff with views over the Tasman sea.  Cloud cleared just enough to give us an amazing sunset.  Although we are staying in Cape-Foulwind there has been hardly no wind and the sea is as flat as a tack.  However the vegetation that’s close to coast is bent over at 90 degrees so I’m assuming that most of the times it lives up to its name as the ‘wild west’ of NZ.

Cheers - what a romantic setting... (you cant see the kids trying climb the tree tho!)