The rain followed us from Queenstown to Wanaka, where we spoilt ourselves with two nights in a well priced, rather nice ski lodge just out of town. Rather than get even more wet, we rejoiced in the shelter that four walls and a roof provide and caught-up with our blogs. Next stop, Glacier Country.

We set up camp at the Fox Glacier township, perhaps the home of Fox’s Glacier Mints, perhaps not (there aren’t any polar bears here). After night had fallen, we headed out for a forest walk to see the local glow worms. Along the way we picked-up three Japanese fellows would had quickly given-up any hope of navigating the forest with nothing more than the light from their mobile phone. For twenty minutes of my life, I wore the trousers and was indisputably the leader, as I had the torch! My torch, however, wasn’t all-that-and-a-bag-of-peanuts and so the one dim spotlight between five of us made for an interesting trek. Not as interesting as the single-file, hand-holding tour group of “more mature” folk who were navigating the forest trek in complete darkness. Averted their sensitive eyes from the end of my torch, they reasoned that after their eyes had adjusted to the darkness that they’d be able to see more glow worms. Passing them in the opposite direction, I wished them good luck in navigating the narrow foot bridge just ahead…! Of course, I was joking–there was no bridge–but my work was done as their confident strides had now turned into baby-steps.

The next day, we were rewarded which a glorious weather-slot in which to levitate in Da Vinci’s flying machine over the two local glaciers: Fox and Franz Josef. This country’s a bit mad: a few days ago I’m sure we were punting down a river, swimming with dolphins, standing on a deserted beach, cruising through fiords to sea, jetboating down a narrow canyon — now we’re stood atop a mountain, throwing snowballs at each other!

Following the good advice of some travel buddies that we met in Lake Tekapo who shared with us some secrets for getting the most out of a glacier helicopter flight, which I shall now share with you. Firstly, on the surface of it all four helicopter companies offer the same routes for the same price. All of them will discount from NZ$195 to NZ$180 without strenuous bartering. One company however, Glacier Helicopters, offers further discounts when pushed further. In fact, we were offered a ‘free upgrade’ to the next most expensive flight, a saving of NZ$150 for us as a couple — now we’re talking. Secondly, nice guys finish first: after establishing the nationalities of your fellow passengers, hand back and allow the others to board the chopper first — they’ll be ushered into the four rear seats, allowing you and your lady friend to be helped into the two front seats, with the best views right next to the pilot. You’re wondering why you need to ascertain the nationalities of the fellow guests? As our travel buddies said, some nationalities don’t follow polite British etiquette, meaning that all bets are off: in this case, position yourself first in line and create a diversion by pointing backwards and shouting, “was that a helicopter that just crash-landed?!” Immediately start run-walking towards the front seats.

Naturally, I’ve added “become a helicopter pilot” to my list of Things To Do Before I Die; not least because, I’ll never have to worry about getting the front seat ever again. Claire’s added “get the cute, apparently unmarried pilot’s telephone number” to her list…

Claire just wants to add – the helicopter flight was amazing, especially as we had the front seats, and after landing on the glacier and playing in the snow I had a big beaming smile on my face. The luge has been knocked into second spot on my list of top NZ experiences.

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