On the road again...

This morning we got up bright and early and flew into Queenstown. We needed to pick up our rental car and hit the road to get to Franz Josef glacier. We booked our rental car online but upon arriving, we quickly learned that we must have gone with a serious mom and pop business without realizing it. There wasn't a counter like there was for Budget or Avis and we had no idea where to go. We borrowed people's phones but eventually we were told to just sit by a courtesy phone hoping someone would call us back.   Knowing that was a terrible plan (do courtesy phones even take calls?  What if someone was using the phone?  There's probably not call waiting.), but not having any clue what else to do, we took a seat near the phone.  Randomly though, a man suddenly appeared 5 minutes later and said and had our car. He was driving our rental so we drove about 5 minutes away from the airport to his "office" and where we were to meet him to return the car. Interesting. Once we drove away, he basically walked off into oblivion. Strange.

The rental car office- We're to meet him to do the car return.  He walked off in the distance behind Will with a bucket full of keys and some pens and papers, his portable "office." 

After getting the car, we immediately hit the road to Franz Josef where we would be staying the night to do a glacier hike the next morning.  We hoped to stop somewhere to eat first but it was immediately time to get up the first big mountain. Driving to the glacier is not for the faint of heart and I was definitely white knuckling it the entire time and screaming for Will to slow down so we didn't drive off a cliff. There were lots of windy roads and it was giving me anxiety. Once we passed the first big mountain, we stopped at the first place that had food because we were starving. It was the most adorable cafe with delicious sandwiches and baked goods.

 

After that, it was time to hit the road again!  Good thing we stopped when we did because for most of the entire way to the Glacier, there was nothing. Honestly I couldn't believe how little there was. No gas stations, nothing. We did make a stop at the Blue Pools Walk though. It was right off the main highway and only a 30 min walk. Sadly, it wasn't quite the same blue I saw from pictures online (maybe due to the cloudy day) but it was still pretty cool nonetheless. 

This is what the Blue Pools is supposed to look like... Not quite on this cloudy day, but the water was super clear.

The drive was about 5 hours and there was a mix of terrains.  Sometimes mountainous and dry, mainly rain forest like with drizzling rain.  Sometimes we couldn't see anything but trees on both sides of the road and sometimes we were driving along the coast.  However, for most of it, it was super remote.  There was a stretch of about 2 1/2 hours where we didn't pass a single thing, not even a gas station!  Luckily, I had read that and we had a full tank.  It's pretty crazy! 

Once we made it to Franz Josef, we were exhausted from the drive and just went to get dinner before going to bed. We are definitely NOT road trip people.  This ribeye and burger were much deserved!