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A bit like white water rafting but not much. Until I was in Queenstown about three weeks ago I had never heard of white water sledging, or its other name hydrospeed. Yesterday I took the opertunity to have a go on the Kawarau River between Wanaka and Queenstown with Frogz. Suited up in a nice thick wet suit and wearing flippers you hold on to a sledge which goes under your upper body and then float down the river through the rapids.
I have now moved on to Franz Josef where I am going to be doing a guided glacier walk tomorrow. Despite being only a short distance from Mt Cook, again it has taken me a couple of days to get here due to the mountains being in the way for a direct route.

Yesterday I took the bus from Oamaru to Mt Cook Village. Unfortunately the views on the way and upon arrival were not that great as it was raining. Luckily the forcast for it to start clearing in the evening, and then to clear completely today. So thismorning I got up went and hired some walking boots, and set off to walk the Mueller Hut Route. The walk took less time than in the description with me taking 2h40 for the climb up, and 2h15 for the return journey.
As forcast it had cleared up but not completely. Despite this there were still some great views, although the cloud surrounded Mt Cook for almost the entire day with it only clearing once I was about 5 mins from finnishing the walk.
Hopefully it will stay nice and clear tomorrow and I can find another great walk to do.

The say after the canyoning trip I was up early to catch the bus for a day trip to Milford Sound which is aprox 45 miles north west of Queenstown. Unfortunately that is the straight line distance and there is no road that follows this route across the mountains. This means that the actual distance to travel to the sound is 180 miles. Rather than returning to Queenstown I spent a couple of nights in Te Anau.
Another early morning bus took me to Invergargill ready for a morning departure to Stewart Island (Rakiura). Here I spent three days walking the Rakiura Track one of New Zelands Great Walks. Stewart Island is supposedly the place where you are most likely to see a Kiwi, unfortunately the only ones I managed to see where of the human and fruit varieties. A couple of people that I met on the walk that had done the longer 10 day North West circuit walk said that they had seen a few, and had even had them walk across the path in the middle of the day (kiwis are nocturnal). The day after the walk I made a trip to Ulva Island which has been cleared of predators, and turned into a sanctury for rare and endangered birds.
Back on the south Island I have made the journey up to Dunedin where yesterday evening I went on a wildlife trip on the Otago peninsula, managing to see Royal Albertrosses, Fur Seals, Sealions, Yellow-eyed Penguins, Blue penguins, as well as lots of other birds.
Next on the agenda is a trip to Mt Cook village, where I hope to spend another couple of days walking.