I infamously failed to climb Mt. Fuji last year, so what possessed me to climb a glacier I don’t know. I would have felt reassured seeing the elderly and children also attempting it, were it not for the fact that a bunch of primary schoolkids climbed Fuji a couple of days before I did. Luckily, it wasn’t too taxing, and more of a trek than a climb, so I didn’t embarrass myself this time. (I still blame the altitude!)
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In Manchester, you have the curry mile, a semi-misnomered kilometer stretch of curry houses and jewelery shops. In the same vein, Hokatika could be the Jade Square Mile. From the quaint little clocktower in the town centre, all you can see down each road are jade workshops interspersed with craftstores, glassblowing centres and, yes, jewelery stores. I awoke, still alive, still free and still not frozen, albeit with a healthy dose of condensation and a coldness in my bones that I anticipate will be a daily occurrence in later years. Sleeping in cars: frugal - yes, comfortable - not exactly, and something I want to do a lot of in the future - definitely not.
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