Rain and shine, 2 fiords
The early ferry back to Bluff is almost empty, and so is the bus up to Te Anau, a nice little town in the heart of Fiordland.
One of the most popular attractions on South Island has to be Milford Sound. Coaches full of camera wielding Japanese tourists arrive everyday to join the mega cruise boats at lunchtime. Most people travel from Queenstown which means a 13 hour long day. They are quite clearly fools! Those of us in the know, who have consulted a map leave at a much more sensible time from Te Anau and arrive in the afternoon as the crowds are leaving and take a small boat cruise out onto the lake.
I went for the day with Trips’n’Tramps who, along with the obligatory photo stops, dropped us off to do part of the Routeburn track to the Key Summit. It was raining heavily, which is unsruprising, as around 2 out of 3 days see rain, with the average rainfall in this region being 7 to 9 metres! This means when we get to Milford Sound it does look very impressive. The Mitre Peak boat takes us for a couple of hours out to the Tasman Sea and back. This is really a fiord and not a sound, the 22km long bit of water misnamed by the southern Europeans. Waterfalls cascade down steep slopes, and the moutains slip in and out of view amongst the mist and cloud. It wasn’t windy enough to see the waterfalls being blown back up the cliffs. The shadows and silhouettes give the whole place a mystical feel.
On our return journey, we are very lucky to see a pod of 3-4m long bottlenose dolhpins, who oblige the 20 or so onboard by swimming in the bow wave and playing alongside.
On a completely different day, one of rare hot sunshine and clear blue skies we head off to the bigger and much less touristed Doubtful Sound. In 1770, our friend Cpt. Cook and his imaginative naming scheme was at work again. He was doubtful that his ship would be able to sail back out of the fiord if he entered on a westerly wind…
From Manapouri, a small township just south of Te Anau, we spend 45 minutes crossing the lake of the same name to West Arm, the site of the big hydro power station. After a quick look round, we drive the 22km over the 670m high Wilmot Pass with rare views over the inner half of the sound.
The Charmain Karol takes a small bunch of us for a few hours around the various side valleys and down the main fiord to the sea. We see cormorants and various other birds I can’t remember, and as luck would have it we see dolphins again. Though these aren’t nearly as interested in us as at Milford. The steep slopes are covered in trees and plants that cling on for dear life with only 6 inches of top soil. Regular slumps are visible, some from the recent 7.1 magnitude earthquake. The faultline that runs throughout both islands is visible here.
I have to say they were right. Although it was nice to see in the sunlight, and actually see some peaks, the rain made Milford Sound much more impressive.
Now onto something more active…
Tags: Travel
Nick