The highlight of a trip to New Zealand's South Island is a visit to Mount Cook, say the guide books. On a clear day. But as the Maori word for New Zealand, Aotearoa, means The Land of The Long White Cloud, obviously clear days are at a premium. But as a returning kiwi, on a short holiday, I had a burning desire to revisit Mount Cook.
It is the highest mountain in New Zealand at 3754m, although when I was at school it was 12349ft (3764m). Some years ago, 10 million cubic metres of rock fell off and shortened the peak by 10m.
While the mountain was known to the Maori centuries before, the first European to see Aoraki/Mount Cook was Abel Tasman, on December 13 1642, during his first Pacific voyage. The name Cook, however, is in honour of Captain James Cook, who circumnavigated the islands of New Zealand in 1770 but never saw the mountain. Not until 1914 was the elusive peak summitted, by three New Zealanders on Christmas Day. Since then, avalanches and crevasses have claimed the lives of many climbers - but I had no intention of putting on crampons.
The route normally chosen is a flight into Christchurch and then a drive straight out, missing the Garden City, as it is so rightly called, altogether. But as this is where I grew up, I delayed a while and enjoyed the parks and botanical gardens bordering the banks of the river Avon, named after the river in England that flows through that country's Christchurch.
Azaleas, rhododendrons, daffodils, even lilac trees created drifts of astonishing colour throughout the city.
When I left, I took the main highway south, becoming increasingly aware of the Southern Alps etched above the green, rolling hills.
Once off the highway, heading west, I spotted Lake Tekapo , a sheet of pure, turquoise water below the white mountains. There, a small, stone church, The Church of the Good Shepherd, perches on the edge of the lake, picture-postcard perfect with a sheepdog statue standing proudly by the water.
I moved on, crossing bridges that spanned braided rivers into wide, lonely valleys with the ever-present snowy peaks drawing closer and closer.
The colour of the next lake, Lake Pukaki, was equally astonishing. As the glaciers grind their way down the mountains, they deposit untold millions of tiny, stone particles, which are flushed along by the rivers to create the surreal, ice-blue colour of the water. It reminded me of family picnics long ago, lazing in the sun-drenched tussock grass beside the lake, in crisp mountain air.
As the valley narrowed and the mountains soared beside me, to my delight I found my car suddenly surrounded by a throng of woolly heads and backs belonging to a flock of fat merino sheep. Not far behind came the faithful and enormously clever sheep dogs, strutting their stuff and hustling their charges along.
Only once I continued did I become aware of the great, white triangle ahead - the majestic face of Mount Cook. The sun was shining, the sky blue, the mountain clear! It towered above the valley in all its snowy splendour, with a little tuft of cloud billowing from the summit like a pennant.
Mt Cook Village, where visitors stay, is very low-key. It was first used by alpinists in the last century, who explored and conserved the area. Now there is a backpackers' lodge, some camp sites, a youth hostel and a few lodges. I parked at the most luxurious, The Hermitage, which is known for its exclusivity (price), the floor-to-ceiling viewing windows in the lounge bar and as the home of the Sir Edmund Hillary Exhibition (he used to scale Mount Cook regularly as practice for Everest).
With dozens of tour buses in the car park, and every passenger from every bus outside with a camera, I decided it was time for a walk - in the direction a signpost said was Kea Point. The kea is the cheeky New Zealand mountain parrot, famous for removing rubber from windscreen wipers, food from tents and anything that glitters. They also have a distinctive cry, an ancient song in these lonely valleys.
The valley itself looked primordial. There were no tourists here - they were all eating noodles in the restaurant. The silence was complete and the clouds drifted softly across the peaks. The sun shone but the air was chilly.
The end point of the walk is at the moraine wall of the Mueller Glacier. Ten metres high, it has been gouged out by the relentless movement of the river of ice. Below are puddles of ice-blue water, the sink holes left behind that one day may form a lake themselves.
The Hooker Glacier is beyond the wall and, above it, Ball Pass is clear, a soft curve high along the sharp ridges. Climbers cross this pass from the Tasman Glacier to reach Mount Cook. New Zealand trampers can spend days in the Alps, sleeping in basic overnight shelters.
Bad weather is not unusual in the high places and these huts are life saving.
However, today the sun is beaming on the many faces of the peaks and Mount Cook is benign. Many tourists will be gearing up for the "flightseeing" offers and glacier walking, maybe some alpine skiing, heli-biking or heli-skiing, but for me time stands still in this white arena.
Later that evening, I choose to sit in the Hermitage lounge, on a big, black, leather couch, sipping one of Central Otago's finest pinot noirs. The lounge is empty. The day trippers have gone. This is it. The view is awesome. Mount Cook rises tall and proud between the other peaks. The summit is completely clear and the setting sun has turned the face of the mountain rose-coloured. The life-sized statue of Sir Edmund outside the window gazes calmly into the distance.
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'New Zealand's highest peak lost 10m when a rock fell off'
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