From Wanaka we headed North to Mt. Cook National park to see the highest mountain of New Zealand (3724m). We arrived at noon to Mt. Cook village. The village was in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by mountain ranges and glaciers. The whole village was actually just a couple of hotels, a restaurant and a visitor center. We stayed at the national park for two nights, camping at White Horse campground. 

First we went to the visitor center, since we were interested in hiking to Mueller hut, but were not sure whether conditions were good enough. And indeed they advised to have additional gear such as crampons and ice hakes. 

We were a little tired after doing several summits in a couple of days, so we decided to do a short and easy trek that is considered one of the best in the area – the Hooker Valley trek. It was a 10km return walk along the valley floor to Hooker glacier. Indeed the walk was popular. Despite a few clouds the weather was perfect which made this a good and easy walk for that afternoon. The trail went along the valley, crossing three bridges over a glacier river and ending up to a glacier lagoon with good views of Mt.Cook. 

Since the day was clear we decided to do some stargazing. The national park is part of Dark sky reserve because there is very little light pollution. We decided to go a little away from the village and to do the Hooker valley again. When it got later it got pitch black and a little bit scary. In the darkness we saw two glowing eyes in the bush. First we thought it was feral cat of some sort but on closer look it was a possum. 

The next day wasn’t nearly as good as the day before. It was really cloudy and it looked like it was going to rain. Still we decided to do a couple of short hikes on top of the hills. The first one started just next to our camping spot. It’s unofficial name was ‘Stairway to heaven’. A 2200 steps up to the hill. On a clear day it would have been a great view point for the Hooker valley and Mt.Cook but all we saw was fog (so we literally had stairway directly into the clouds). The trail was about 3 hours return. From there we could have continued to Mueller hut, ’cause we heard from people coming down that it would have been ok to hike there with just regular trekking shoes. But since it would have taken additional 4 hours and we didn’t have lunch with us we headed back to our campsite. 

In the evening we did the second hike we did was called Red Tarns track, 2 hour return. It also started with stairs going top of the hill ending up to a nice plateau with reddish little pond.

Next day we packed our tent and started to head towards the east coast to Oamaru. On the way we drove to Tasman Glacier and stopped to have a quick look at the views, which were stunning.