Franz Josef – Glacier of Tears
Franz Josef is a glacier located on the West Coast of New Zealand’s South Island.
The glacier is 12 kilometers long and together with the Fox Glacier which lies 20 kilometers to the South, it is unique in the fact that it descends from the Southern Alps to just 240 metres above sea level.
The area surrounding the two glaciers is designated a World Heritage Site.
The early Maori knew Franz Josef as Ka Roimata o Hinehukatere (The tears of Hinehukatere). Legend tells of the girl Hinehukatere who loved climbing in the mountains and persuaded her lover Tawe to come with her. Tawe was less experienced in climbing but loved to accompany Hinehukatere. Then an avalanche swept him from the peaks to his death. Hinehukatere was broken hearted and her tears flowed down the mountain and froze to form the glacier.
First explored by Europeans in 1865 the glacier was named after Emperor Franz Josef I of Austria by the German explorer Julius von Haast.
Franz Josef, which ends 19 km from the Tasman Sea, has retreated since the last ice age and it is believed to have extended into the sea some 10,000 to 15,000 years ago.
Having retreated several kilometres between the 1940s and 1980s, the glacier entered an advancing phase in 1984 and at times has moved at the phenomenal rate (by glacial standards) of 70 cm a day.
Due to strong snowfall Franz Josef is one of the few glaciers in New Zealand which is still growing while others, mostly on the eastern side of the Southern Alps, have been shrinking heavily, a process attributed to global warming.
The glacier area is one of the main tourist attractions of the West Coast, with around 250,000 visitors a year. Guided and unguided walks up to and onto the glacier are possible. The latter require some specialised equipment, namely ice axes and crampons that latch onto a sturdy boot.
Tourists who do not like to climb the actual glacier can also visit the Huwakai Glacier Centre in Franz Josef Village which features a ten metre high indoor ice-climbing wall. The wall is the only one of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere and provides ice climbers with an opportunity to replicate what it would be like to climb the actual glacier.
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