We arrived in Franz Josef on Monday in the early afternoon. On the journey from Greymouth we first of all visited a small town called Hokitika, famous for its Pounamu (Greenstone), where we stopped for breakfast. After a brief trip to the supermarket and cash machines (apparently there wasn't anything in Franz Josef) we carried on to the historic town of Ross, where we had the chance to participate in gold panning. The gold rush had brought thousands of people to this little place in the 1800s and the evidence is still there to this day. We arrived in Franz Josef with the rain pouring down at about 2pm and checked into our hostel. Franz Josef is located on New Zealand's west coast and is built next to a 12km long glacier. Due to the weather there wasn't much to do that afternoon so after a brief check of the internet we just chilled out in the hostel for the rest of the afternoon...this was pretty much the pattern for the next 3 days. The weather was awful for the whole duration of our stay and I only made it out to go paintballing as it was so cold. This was good fun though as we tumbled over trees and had shootouts with eachother. We returned drenched and freezing cold and the hot soup that awaited us was definitely needed. On Friday morning Ella, Jo and I caught the Magic Bus again to Lake Wanaka. Typically as we checked out of Franz Josef, it was a glorious morning, clear skys and sunshine and incredible views of the glacier. Our first stop on the way to Wanaka was Lake Matheson, just past the village of Fox, a lake that in the sunshine produced a perfect mirror reflection. This was due to the tanin that fell from the trees and dyed the lake black. The scenery here was perfect with the snowy mountains enclosing the lake. This was the first point at which I began to love New Zealand...it had taken a while. The Magic bus rolled on inland towards the Central Otago region where the scenery changed dramatically into high plateaus. We stopped for lunch at a little place called Makarora before arriving in Wanaka. This picturesque town is built on Lake Wanaka, hence its name, and in the winter is a ski resort while in the summer, its population more or less triples with the influx of Kiwi holidaymakers. I could have stayed here forever it was so beautiful. We checked into our hostel and then took advantage of the glorious day with an amble around the town. The following morning I arose early to go horse riding through the mountains with a group of girls I had been travelling with. I was on a rather lazy but beautiful horse called Frosty and we took a trek across the mountain range. The views here were truly incredible and at some points it was only us and 7 horses to be seen for miles around. A camera could never picture exactly how it felt to be up there. In the afternoon Jo, Ella and I made a trip to the Puzzling World on the outskirts of Wanaka. At the entrance to this rather bizarre attraction was the Leaning Tower of Wanaka, a huge structure that leans at 53 degrees to the ground. Inside there was museum of optical illusions. One of the features was room in which if you stood on one side you resembled a giant and on the other you looked like a dwarf. This was the technique used in the Lord of the Rings to make the hobbits and elfs really small but I have no idea how they created it. There was also a room of sloping floors in which objects moved against gravity. This was not the most pleasant experience, it kind of felt like the really bad spinning feeling you get when your drunk and made us all feel quite groggy. Lastly there was a 1.5km 3-D maze in which you had to reach 4 corner towers and then the exit. We did manage to complete it despite almost losing the will to live on several occasions and therefore treated ourselves to an ice cream in the cafe after to celebrate. As this was out last evening in Wanaka we returned to the hostel and prepared all our stuff for the departure...next stop Queenstown!!!