Looking eastward to the mountains, we saw, through floating masses of white cloud, the peaks which I have learnt to know from the other side of the Alps. Haidinger Peak showed square and white against blue sky, and we had fleeting glimpses of Mounts Cook and Tasman—the latter, a sharp snowy peak at the head of the Fox Glacier. Below Mount Tasman the glacier curves down in a broad sweep of white ice, between sombre green forests, towards the river-valleys. From where our horses stood, the wide river-bed—grey shingle with silver streaks of water—made a spacious foreground to the mountains. All about us were low-growing, green shrubs, and tall, feathery, white sprays of "toi-toi" grass. On our left, looking down the river, were low, bush-covered hills, separated by broad gaps, where, only a few miles distant, several rivers flow into the Tasman Sea.
To-day's ride was not lacking in excitement. The previous night there had been a high gale, the telephone wire was down at the fords; and in the forest, trees had been blown across road and wire, one tree so big that it completely blocked the way, and we had to get off our horses. The guide rapidly cut off straggling branches with an axe, which he had brought in case of accidents; we then climbed the trunk, and the horses easily jumped over.
We came safely to our journey's end at Waiho Gorge, by the Franz Josef glacier, at nightfall, greeted cheerily by the light streaming through the open door of the hotel, and by the kindly welcome of my last year's friends.
GLACIER HOTEL, WAIHO GORGE.
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