Amber on Ice

After I finished my trek, I headed back to Christchurch to start my 2-week Magic Bus Tour of the Islands. Magic Bus is an inexpensive bus line that mostly caters to backpackers and low-budget travellers. YOU can buy packages with or without housing as well. I opted for the housing to keep things simple and stayed at the YHA Hostels all throughout New Zealand. It was a great choice for me. YHAs are really clean and the ones in NZ are far different than the ones in Europe, at least 10 years ago. Many families and older people stay in the YHA, it's not all crazy young college kids. YHAs all have dorms, shared bathrooms and a nice large kitchen for cooking.
The pics are of me serving myself at the Monteith's brewery in Greymouth, NZ. It's located on the western-coast of the South Island. I had taken the Tranz-Alpine Railroad from Christchuch over there, we traveled up and over Arthur's Pass. Monteith's was a favorite beverage of choice down under. The other pic is of the Franz-Joseph Glacier. I did a guided hike up the glacier. Yeah, why did I need to see more glaciers at this point? Well, this one is a tropical glaicier so we could hike in shorts. It was a pretty rainy day but fortunately the guide company gives you great raingear. There were these wild parrots all over the area at the base of the glaicer, that was strange parrots and glaciers. THese birds had figured out how to open backpacks and get at peoples food, crazy little buggers.