Outback to the Glaciers

....with a sheep farm here.....and a cow farm there......eieio.  We have crossed The Ditch (Tasman Sea) and are now cruising along through New Zealand.  It's definitely beautiful....with lots of farmland and snow capped mountains. 


It's also freeeeeeeeeeeeezing!!!  Today we traveled through Arthur's Pass, which climbs to more than 2700 feet through the National Park and is the highest and most spectacular pass across the Southern Alps. 

This entire route is filled with significant engineering extremes from viaducts, bridges, rock shelters and waterfalls redirected into chutes.  Arthur’s Pass National Park itself is a landscape of two halves. On the eastern side you'll see wide, shingle-filled riverbeds and vast swathes of beech forest. Descend the western side and you venture through dense rainforest alongside and over deeply gorged rivers.