June30, Thursday.  In front of the hotel in Chch before 7 am,waiting suitcases and all,  for the bus to go to Mt. Cook, NZ tallest mountain.  By 1:30 pm I arrived at the Hermitage, the national park resort.  Approaching my destination, I was awe struck by the scenery.  These are called the alps of the southern hemisphere, and are aptly named.  Everyone has mentioned that they are having an unusually warm winter, no snow, snow on the mountain tops, but none at the mountains base.  My room faces Mt. cook thru a huge picture window.  Ate lunch in the sunshine thru the glass wall of the dinning room.  What a change, warm sunshine, after all of the rain in Sydney, melbourne, Hobart, Adelaide, Auckland, Rotorua and Wellington. and I was tired of being wet every time I went out to see the sights.  It's  in the lower 50's, but sunny, nice.  Went for a long walk to the base of a mountain on a well graveled trail, an hour later I was ate the trails end, at the mountains base, with glaciers almost down to the brock strewn base.  In the quiet, several times I heard the rumblings of avalanches from just around the corner of a foothill adjacent to the mountain.  Sounds like a train without any of the metal wheel or rail components, just a rumble, rumble down the mountain side. And I get four meals like that: lunch thru lunch for the 26 hours I am here.   My meals are pre-paid, and they are really something, delicious, linen tablecloths, ordering from a menu, classy.  Well that's about it for today!