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further south and coming across Lake Pukaki surrounded by immense mountains and snow-capped peaks , none least of which is Mount Cook ,
Aoraki .
Aoraki , is the highest of all New Zealand ’ s mountains , 3724 metres . Not high by world standards , yet certainly dwarfing anything we have in Australia . Amongst the low cloud and rain squalls something felt special about this peak , it seemed to glimmer within the gloom , and I wondered if the legends could be true .
Many believed the name to mean “ cloud piercer ”, easy to see why , yet the local Ngãi Tahu people say it is a reference to Te Waka o Aoraki or Aoraki ’ s Canoe . Either way it ’ s a romantic notion that only Indigenous people could produce , for the Europeans simply named it after
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