New Zealand Hooker Valley

We squeezed a lot of adventure into this trip from hiking, jet boating, flying along the coast, cruising in Milford Sound, and finally my chance to go paragliding. I had noticed a paragliding operation in Queenstown high up on a bluff overlooking the lake and town, at the top of a Gondola. We took the gondola up for a hike to a local peak called Ben Lomond, but on the way back I decided to sign up for the paragliding. This was a tandem ride with a sail that could take two, parachutes for the pilot and passenger, and much to my surprise, a camera extended out on an arm that could be controlled through a cable. We rigged up, waited for the right breeze, and then walked over the edge of the bluff. We quickly rose up and could have played with thermals to go even higher, but instead flew out over Queenstown proper. We sailed over the beach, casting our shadow along the shoreline so, according to my pilot, some of the bathing beauties might roll over. We did some maneuvers and then swooped in, flared, and made a perfect standing, four-leg landing.

On our way back from Milford Sound, we visited Hooker Valley, which runs up against the south side of the highest mountain in New Zealand, Mt Cook. I believe it's in the 14,000 ft range with a perennial snow cap. We hiked up to the glacier along the Hooker River, a raging torrent of freezing cold water, even in the relatively low rainfall condition we experienced during our trip. The face of the glacier was very massive and impressive, the surface covered with fallen rocks, and the layering from past sequences of snow and rock avalanches very evident. It makes one feel very small and insignificant. We ate lunch just below the face of the glacier but began to beat a hasty retreat as an afternoon rain began and cold gusts of wind began to blow down the valley. We worried we'd have a repeat of an earlier group that had to cross the cabled hanging bridge with 60 mph gusts blasting down the valley. They could only get over one at a time...on their hands and knees. We were lucky and had an easy crossing.