Laundry! ....And a Glacier Walk

Typing this on top of a broken washing machine - don't worry, there was at least one working one so I have some clean clothes once more. I had to walk around a bit in my pjs through a different hotel's reception, past a busload of chinese tourists, wait for change by a bunch of german tourists....I'm not sure what image they have of Americans but I'm pretty sure....this....(*gestures to all of me*) isn't helping. What can ya do though? I gots dirty clothes and I wants them clean. Also I'm out of pants. I only brought 3 pairs - 4 if you count my pjs My jeans are dirty from...something. They had a big ole dirt stain on the back My long leggings got a lot of stuff spilled on them yesterday during all the eating and drinking in the car (windy roads don't make it an easy process) and my short leggings went through several glacier tunnels. To clarify - these were super frickin tiny tunnels, *that I almost didn't fit through* that I went down head first and army crawled until even that wasn't possible and I had to pull myself out by a rope they had at least left at the exit for that exact purpose. So how did I get *there*? Today we're...well we're staying in the Fox Glacier Township - the area near one of New Zealand's 4 largest glaciers. Can you guess which one? (It's Fox Glacier) I bungled that - I was supposed to book us closer to Franz Josef - another one of the top 4, but I don't know what happened. I don't know if I made a mistake and thought this area was near our activity, or maybe all the places near Franz Josef were totally booked. No idea. All I DO know, is I booked us a hotel 30 minutes away from the Franz Josef Glacier Township where we had to get to today because back in August, Sarah and I booked ourselves the super cool experience of taking a helicopter to a glacier, and then walking on it for like, 3 hours? I'm not sure when we actually made it up top, but we landed back at home base at like 4:45pm, and we started getting ready to head up around 12:30. The drive between townships isn't bad though. And since it was our only activity for today, we had a leisurely morning, woke up late, drove to Franz Josef, had early lunch, then got ready for the main event. We had been warned in advance by experienced New Zealand travelers to book ourselves an extra day in case the weather makes them cancel. And when we checked in, they were warning us they might - we had a couple of clouds threatening to cover the area and make it unsafe for helicopters to navigate. We kept our fingers crossed, and even right up until we were standing at the helicopter pad to head up, they were considering it. But! The clouds moved away and made it safe for us to go! We had a group of 10 people with us, and we split that into 2 helicopters - Me and Sarah and two women from Taiwan in our helicopter (and pilot of course) and the other 6 in a 2nd helicopter. Apparently they - at max - only allow 200 people onto the glacier on any given day. It seemed pretty busy today, but our guide - Brad - said we didn't quite make that today. Once we were split, we calmly walked into our helicopters, not touching the doors, and then we took off! It was a short flight - the glacier IS right there pretty much. But it was awesome! Saw the mountains at eye level instead of having to crane my neck up....and up....and up....and then we properly saw the glacier. I've been lucky enough to be on a glacier before - but this one was different! I suppose they all are and they're all constantly changing, but Sheets of towering ice in white and blue with streaks of black. It rose and fell and seemed to tilt at impossible angles sometimes, and it glared with such white intensity that it's impossible to gaze at for long without protection. Sunglasses were a must. They had a path carved for us that they pretty much change weekly if not daily - the glacier moves 2m a day. Brad carried a pick axe to carve new steps into the ice as needed, but we also had crampons on! Ice spikes attached to heavy boots they provided at base camp. (We also had a ski pole!) It's incredible. And I know I say something similar to a lot of my experiences. But this ice has been around for AGES and yet it might be gone in my lifetime. The way it ebbs and flows, shapes land, moves mountains *literally* (if in tiny pieces) and I get to experience even a fraction of it. I get to see the way the water carves new ravines into the ice (even in just the time we were there! Though to be fair, the ravines were like, an inch wide) how the water tasted (we all refilled our water bottles from one of the glacier streams - a clear one), and how the ice changes. Brad told us that even *yesterday* an ice formation that looked like a thumb (it was like 30 ft tall? More?) wasn't there! Or it was, but it was so vastly different that he couldn't describe it beyond "ice clump". And even getting stuck in a tiny hole (obviously I did get out, and luckily it was mostly because my camera was in the way) I had a great time. I loved being up there and getting to see it so close, and we could see the ocean from our view! It was one of those things that it ended all too soon. We waited at the top of the glacier for the helicopter to return, and ours seemed like it didn't get purchase at first on the made landing zone, but it did, and off we went, back to the valley floor. Sarah and I had a new person in the back seat of the helicopter with us - one of the guides who had helped create the path today, and when we landed we helped her carry two pickaxes back to the building. We sang our Dwarf Working song. (Disney don't sue me.) Returned our trekking gear, and then the day was mostly over. We had dinner at a place called Alice May - had dessert at the Landing (My first pavlova!) and this was all in the Franz Josef township. We got back to the Fox township around 8? And when we got back, I decided I couldn't wait to do laundry anymore. Our hotel's laundry is broken, but they have a sister hotel across the street (no idea why) so they let me use their laundry room. I drove because of reasons ( I tried to avoid being seen and we all know how that went) because the laundry in the sister hotel had a small parking lot immediately outside the door leading into the hall where the laundry room was. Started typing while I waited for things and here we are! The dryer buzzed before I finished the post, so I parked back at the hotel I'm actually staying at, and I saw another kea! They are apparently *rascals* But I got excited. This one scurried off behind a parked bus and I just went inside. Sorry bud. We're going to try and go to a Kiwi encounter tomorrow! And now I got clean clothes to do it!