Photo: Lake Pukaki Mt Cook Scenery New Zealand

The scenery is stunning as you stand above the green landscape overlooking Lake Pukaki, Mt Cook and the Southern Alps on the South Island of New Zealand.

From a viewpoint along the road side in Canterbury on the South Island of New Zealand, lush green trees surround the foreground of this picture dropping off to the unique colored water of Lake Pukaki. Across the lake, the peak of Mt Cook stands above the rest of the Southern Alps with the mountain tops covered in snow.Not many lakes are made up of this blue hue but due to Lake Pukaki being fed by a glacier, it is truly a coloring that cannot be easily missed. Covering an area of about eighty square kilometers, the scenery of and around Lake Pukaki is some of the South Island's finest.Before Mt Cook towers above the landscape, a small island sits off the point as the icy blue color of Lake Pukaki encompasses it. A beautiful spot when boating in the summer where you can enjoy the scenery of the New Zealand landscape from a different angle.Summertime fun brings out the people that come to Lake Pukaki to partake in many of the water sports under the sunny skies. ... continue below the picture...

... Mountain climbers also attempt fate by trying to scale the rocky cliffs of the 3,764 peak of Mt. Cook. When winter approaches, Mt Cook becomes a skier's paradise as people spend their days making their way down the glacier ice fields. From atop the mountains, you can see for miles across the Southern Alps and the Canterbury region.Scenery like this is hard to top and many photographers spend hours capturing the beauty of the South Island of New Zealand. A place where a vacation is truly a vacation, relaxing is what it is all about without a mass amount of running around from city to city.Mt Cook and the Southern Alps with Lake Pukaki in the foreground, Mackenzie Basin, Canterbury, South Island, New Zealand.