Christchurch to Franz Josef (South Island Day 1)

We flew into Christchurch which is on the east coast of the South Island, kind of in the middle there. This is where we would begin our eight day journey. From here we picked up our six person RV (although we had seven people) and after a quick stop to pick up groceries (mostly sausages, pasta, juice and beer) we headed for the west coast. I happened to be the only one who could drive manual, so I got the job of chauffeuring everyone 2100km around the South Island- yippie!
Only about 2 hours out of Christchurch we came upon these giant limestone boulders along the side of the road and decided to pull over. Our inner child(ren?) came out, as the often would during this trip, and we began climbing all of the boulders to the top of the hill. The view of course was magnificent.
We still had about 5 hours left to drive and the sun was moving quickly, so we said goodbye to our beloved rocks and moved on. The next 3 hours of driving were utterly terrifying. It was my first day driving in New Zealand (so other side of the road), not too mention it being a cumbersome camper van that crawled up hill so slow I swore I saw a snail passing us at one point. We were headed for Arthur's pass which goes directly through the alps. And while the drive was very scenic with giant mountain flanking us on each side, the road was very narrow, windy, and steep, which made for a nerve racking drive. My main goal at hand was to avoid wrecking the RV, especially because the rental place took an imprint of my Mastercard and could charge up to $2500 in damage if we returned it busted.

Amazingly we made it through the pass and to the west coast just as the sun was setting over the ocean. It was about two hours from here to Franz Josef and the glacier. The drive went relatively well although once again there were many windy parts where the going got extremely slow, especially because it was dark out. But we made it there, bounced around the quaint little town and then found a parking lot to settle in for the night. The next day was our glacier hike.