Milford Sound

breath•tak•ing
Adjective:
1. Astonishing or awe-inspiring in quality, so as to take one's breath away

awe•some
Adjective:
1. Extremely impressive or daunting; inspiring great admiration, apprehension, or fear.
2. Extremely good; excellent.

a•maz•ing
Adjective:
1. Causing great surprise or wonder; astonishing.
2. Startlingly impressive.

Ok, you should get the picture by now. We headed off from Queenstown yesterday morning bound for Milford Sound. I thought what we had already seen in terms of scenery was brilliant. However nothing could have prepared us for what we would witness along the way. The scenery is simply breathtaking. As the journey progressed it became more and more impressive. We would stop off at small nooks on the side of the road and the views were unbelievable from each one.

The drive down to Milford took us a good 5 hours but as I said we stopped off at many points along the way. You can’t help but not stop just to take it in. We got to Milford and boarded the Mariner and set sail. Very calm waters and we cruised around for about an hour, with the skipper taking us right up close to a number of waterfalls. We then put down anchor for the night and jumped into kayaks to have a bit of a paddle about. I thought that I would yet again be the first one to fall out but I soon got the hang of it and away we went. The water was pretty cold and a little choppy. We got back to the boat and Kel and I, in our infinite wisdom, thought we would have a swim. Mind you no one else was game (or as dumb as us) to get into the water. We jumped off the boat and into the water. My god it was cold, so so so cold. So we get back out and by this time our brains probably weren’t operating at full capacity, and also the fact that one of the crew said “oh, its warmer second time in” so off we went again, jumping back in. I can report that no, it wasn’t any warmer. However we managed to get a round of applause from the rest of the passengers who were probably muttering “what idiots” under their breath. But as I said to Kel at least we can say that we swam at Milford Sound!

We had a nice meal and had a short presentation of photos and some videos from Milford Sound which was really cool. The guide really knew his stuff and kept us entertained. The sleep was good I thought, no movement from the water whatsoever.

An early start this morning for some brekky and out to the Tasman Sea. In all honesty Kel and I didn’t really enjoy that part, there was absolutely nothing to see (no seals, dolphins or whales) so it was a bit of a waste. However it was stunning coming back into Milford Sound.

We are now back at Te Anau and are heading off on a horse trek in about an hours time. We will see where some of the Lord Of The Rings was filmed. Tomorrow it’s off towards the glaciers, will most likely stop halfway for some R and R.

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