Trish and I celebrated our 37^th wedding anniversary with a return to the Whangaroa river.

Having been thwarted by very high water levels last time we came this way I had arranged with Josh the local rafting ace and all round backwoods man

to take us down the Whangaroa now that water levels were lower. I had also asked him to arrange with the helicopter pilot to take the four of us on a tour

around Mt Cook and the high glaciers before dropping us high up the river to meet Josh, Rich and the raft.

It was Katie and Yann’s first ride in a helicopter and they could not have had a better day as we followed the path of the Whangaroa up to the Whymper Galcier.

As we climbed higher it looked as though we would hit the huge mountain face in front just before we veered right

to pass over the first of the two high passes.

We seemed to miss the col by inches before we crossed the main divide from west to east and dropped onto the head of the Tasman Glacier

The second col took us onto the head of the Franz Josef Galcier and as a surprise for the other three I had asked the pilot to land on the glacier.

Certainly a photo for the family album.

On the descent we had some truly amazing views over the mountains with the cloud adding greater effect.

From there it was back down the valley and into the rafts after some pretty comprehensive safety briefing from Josh.

Unlike our first trip this river took us through some dramatic gorges and due to the lower river levels some big steep drop offs.

Keeping the raft straight and level took some energetic paddling as we descended the 15km to the take out point

It was also necessary to manhandle the raft over a couple of bottlenecks with some rock climbing thrown in for good measure

The final gorge gave us some great white water rafting

AND THE BIGGEST DROP OFF

Josh’s safety briefing came in handy as in the previous photo Trish is already thrown out of the raft and in the water.

We three plus Josh were about to get wet, the raft ending up on top of Katie and I as Yann held onto the lines.

Trish had also somehow managed to hold onto the back and after sorting ourselves out Josh turned the raft upright and we all

scrambled back in...

All in a memorable day of great contrasts, amazing sights and experiences.