Aoraki
Mount Cook helicopter flight: under the highest mountain in NZ
Aoraki / Mount Cook stands 3,724 metres at the head of a dry brown basin that looks nothing like the West Coast. Below it the Tasman Glacier runs about twenty-three kilometres, the longest in the country. Three flights on this page fly there, and one of them lands you on the glacier from a ski plane.
Quick answer
A Mount Cook helicopter flight costs from $207 for twenty-five minutes with an alpine landing, and carries 514 reviews at 4.7. The Tasman Glacier flight at $357 spends forty minutes over the longest glacier in New Zealand. The unusual one is the ski plane combination at $300: a fixed-wing aircraft on skis lands you on the Tasman and a helicopter brings you back, with 356 reviews at 4.7.
Flying at Aoraki, at a glance
- Aoraki / Mount Cook
- 3,724 mthe highest mountain in New Zealand
- The Tasman Glacier
- About 23 kmthe longest glacier in the country
- Cheapest flight
- $20725 minutes, alpine landing, 514 reviews
- Ski plane combination
- $300two aircraft, 356 reviews at 4.7
- Tasman Glacier flight
- $35740 minutes over the ice
- Where flights leave
- Mount Cook Airportand Glentanner, further down the valley
- From Queenstown
- About 3 hoursby road through the Lindis Pass
- From Christchurch
- About 4 hoursby road
- Climate
- Dry, not wetthe opposite of the West Coast, and fewer cancellations
- Free cancellation
- All threeup to 24 hours before
What it looks like
The Mackenzie is the other half of the South Island
Dry tussock, turquoise lakes and a twenty-three-kilometre glacier.
If you have flown the West Coast, Aoraki will surprise you. There is no rainforest. The Mackenzie Basin is dry tussock country, brown and enormous, with turquoise lakes that get their colour from rock flour ground off the glaciers upstream. The mountains rise out of it abruptly.
Aoraki itself is a sharp triple-peaked mountain, and from a helicopter you are looking across at it rather than up. Twenty-five minutes puts you in the alpine zone beneath it with the Southern Alps running away in both directions.
The Tasman Glacier is not a pretty glacier in the way Franz Josef is. It is covered in rock debris for much of its length, which makes it look grey and dirty, and it is genuinely vast — twenty-three kilometres of ice with a terminal lake at the end of it that did not exist a lifetime ago. Understanding the scale is the point of the flight.
The weather here is drier than the West Coast, which means fewer cancelled flights. It is also more exposed: wind closes more days at Aoraki than rain does.
The three flights
Which one to take
They are genuinely different products rather than lengths of the same one.
- Twenty-five minutes with an alpine landing, $207
514 reviews at 4.7 and the flight most people take. Up the valley, under Aoraki, and a landing on snow in the alpine zone.
- The ski plane and helicopter combination, $300
A ski-equipped aircraft lands on the Tasman Glacier itself and a helicopter flies you back. 356 reviews at 4.7, and a combination almost nowhere else in the world offers.
- Forty minutes over the Tasman Glacier, $357
The longest of the three, spent over the ice rather than beside it. Best if the scale of the glacier is what you came for.
The ski plane is the unusual option here. It is worth understanding what it actually changes.
Helicopter or ski plane→Common questions
Flying at Aoraki, answered
How much is a Mount Cook helicopter flight?
From $207 for twenty-five minutes with an alpine landing, which carries 514 reviews at 4.7. The ski plane combination is $300.
How high is Aoraki / Mount Cook?
3,724 metres, the highest mountain in New Zealand, at the head of the Mackenzie Basin.
How long is the Tasman Glacier?
About twenty-three kilometres, which makes it the longest glacier in the country. It ends in a terminal lake that has formed within living memory.
Can you land on the Tasman Glacier?
Yes — the ski plane combination at $300 lands on the glacier itself. The helicopter flights land on snow in the alpine zone rather than on the glacier surface.
Is the weather better than the West Coast?
Drier, yes, which means fewer cancellations. Wind rather than rain is what closes days at Aoraki.
How do I get to Mount Cook?
About three hours from Queenstown and four from Christchurch by road. Flights leave from Mount Cook Airport or from Glentanner in the same valley.
Go deeper
More on flying over New Zealand
What it costs
From $167 to $687, and what a minute in the air is worth.
The verdictWhich flight is best
One recommendation for each town, and why.
The glaciersThe glacier flights
Rainforest to blue ice in ninety seconds, from $196.
QueenstownFlights from Queenstown
Four flights, from the cheapest here to Milford Sound.
FiordlandMilford Sound by air
Ninety minutes that replaces a ten-hour drive.
WanakaFlights from Wanaka
The quiet alternative to flying from Queenstown.
