Milford Sound

Located in the World Heritage Area of Fiordland, Milford Sound is one of two places accessible by road vehicle in this wild and remote region. The Lonely Planet calls it 'obscenely scenic', and you will indeed struggle for words to describe the moods of this truly awe-inspiring part of the world. Development is strictly controlled by the Department of Conservation, and as a result, Fiordland remains much as it was when captain Cook landed, two hundred years ago.

On the road again
Our time in Queenstown had pretty much cured the severe vehicle fatigue induced by several weeks of living in a Nissan Sunny, and we were more than ready to take on the day's drive to Milford.
Leaving Queenstown, you have the Remarkables on one side and the Eyre mountains on the other. For the first hour or so, the road runs next to the southern end of Lake Wakatipu, through impressive native bush, but when you leave the lake behind, more ordinary, flat farming country takes over. We met these cows between Lumsden and Mossburn, and took the opportunity to have lunch while the herd moved past, which took some considerable time.
Continuing towards Te Anau, you pass through landscapes that are on a grand and inspiring scale: wide open fields and paddocks; rolling, grassy hills; rivers and creeks; and mountains in the distance, all under the endless blue sky. Like the rest of the South Island, the area is sparsely populated (there is less than 1 m people in the entire island) and when you stop and get out, there is a silence and a solitude that makes you feel very small.
We stopped for some refreshments (tea for us, 91 for the car) in Te Anau, and went on an impromptu shopping spree in a music shop where they had an unbearably cute puppy.

The Milford Road

Beyond Te Anau, the next 119 km to Milford Sound offer some incredible sights. After some beautiful, elven-like beech forests, you come to the Eglinton River Valley and its golden grassy fields, and the first hint of what is to come, in the form of the mountains at the end of the valley. This place is interesting in geological ways that I can't quite remember now, but it also has a sense of tranquillity and solitude that you can appreciate without explanatory signs.
(This was, by the way, the Day of Big and Whiffy Hair - I'd been to a hairdresser in Queenstown who took about four inches off and insisted on covering what was left in smelly gunk).

The Mirror Lake
This is a small, almost supernaturally clear and still body of water overlooking the Earl Mountain range. There was a lot of bush, and it was hard to find a place where you could get a good view of the lakes, so this is not the greatest picture. Selina was trying to get down to the edge of the lake, which was actually difficult to see, since the water was so still. It was almost scary, glimpsing the lake as we drove along, since the reflections of the vegetation made them appear like great gorges, great holes, next to the road.

The Homer Tunnel
As the road climbs steadily, edging into the narrow valleys, the mountainsides get steeper and steeper, and since very little vegetation can cling to the sheer rock, any snowfall is likely to result in an avalanche. Masses of snow that had clearly slid and crashed down the dark, bare rock faces appeared on both sides.
The night before, in Queenstown, we had been told that the Milford Road had been blocked by an avalanche that same morning. Of course, we had promptly forgotten this information, and not had a thought for checking the state of the road before leaving Te Anau. Fortunately, when we arrived at the tunnel, there were only the remains of the cleared avalanche left - the picture is dark, but you can see the snow mass on the left, and the opening of the tunnel ahead. (The area about 15 km either side of the tunnel is designated an avalanche zone, and you are not allowed to stop here, so the picture is taken from inside a moving car. Not bad, huh).
The Homer Tunnel is an amazing feat of engineering. Until it was finished, in 1954, there was no practical access to the fiord, except by boat. The tunnel took *20 years* to finish, is 1200m long and cuts underneath a huge peak, and the experience of going down the unlit, dripping, pitch-black hole is a bit like being sucked down a giant drain.
You emerge into some, if possible, even more spectacular scenery - wild, tangled bush, between bare mountainsides and cascading waterfalls and creeks, through which the road wends its way down towards the fiord through many teeth-clenching, steering-wheel-gripping, gravel-crunching hairpin turns.
No picture can really represent the feeling of this truly majestic place, and of the imposing proximity of the mountains, but perhaps you can get some idea from this photo of our hostel - the only one in Milford Sound.

Cruising Milford Sound

The next day dawned cold and clear, and we made our way down to the settlement, which consists of one hotel (closed for winter), one airstrip, one pub, one Department of Conservation office the size of a garden shed, and one robot-operated petrol station - and a ferry terminal from which cruising boats of several kinds depart.
Mitre Peak (left) is the jewel in the crown, a sharp, snow-capped cone that rises above the fiord, almost to perfectly majestic and beautiful to be real. This picture was taken from Cemetery Point, just under the Bowen Falls (more of them later) as you can see from the spray.
It was a beautiful, sunny day, but there were considerable winds at altitude - you can see the snow being blow off the summit of the Peak.

Below the surface
Milford Sound is not really a sound at all, it is a proper fiord, meaning that it is created by glacier movement. Fiordland enjoys more rainfall than almost anywhere else on earth - in one day, it can clock up as much as some European countries get in a year. Because there is so little vegetation on the steep mountainsides, it all ends up in the fiord, and because freshwater is less dense than seawater, the rainwater ends up floating on top of the fiord in a 5-15 metres deep layer. Freshwater lets through less sunlight than seawater - it acts as a great filter on top of the fiord, which leads to some pretty unusual and interesting conditions in the depths. You get fish, corals and other critters in Milford Sound that you normally would find in the deep seas, because it is so dark.
To allow people to appreciate this very unusual ecosystem, an observatory has been built and towed out into the middle of the fiord. It is basically a barge with an exhibition area above and a round, glass-walled observatory area, reached by spiral stairs, some ten or twelve metres under the surface. There is a surprising amount going on down there, fish and corals and shrimp and sea cucumbers and starfish, all doing their thing on little shelves outside the windows, just as if you weren't there staring at them. It's hard taking a picture through four-inch thick glass into the green murk of the sea, so this is a pretty substandard illustration of what is really quite an awesome sight.

The entrance to Milford Sound from the Tasman Sea.

Bob enjoying the scenery.

Thousands of silvery veins of rainwater find their way down the mountainsides and colour the fiord a deep jade green.

Rainbows sparking in the sun and wind.

Bowen Falls
These falls are the largest in Milford Sound - not the tallest, but they shift the most water. They are named after Lady Bowen, wife to some Victorian gentleman or other, who happened by. The waters crash down with an impressive roar, and generate blasts of fine mist where they hit the rocks. The effect is one of vertical rain, and although cold, it's pretty enjoyable - at least Bob thought so, as you can see below. (Simon doesn't look too impressed, though). The vegetation nearby bears the marks of this continuous freezing assault - all the tree-trunks and branches and bushes are bare on the side facing the falls, and they all lean away from it, as if they were tryingt to run away.

We had another day in Milford (which Selina spent kayaking on the sound, brave soul that she is) before heading back. After the company of giants in Milford, the friendlier, more comprehensible landscapes near Te Anau seemed unchallenging, and Te Anau itself was as loud and brightly lit as ever New York City. (And the sunset over Te Anau Downs was beautiful).
We spent the night at a motel near Manapouri, where we watched Pushing Tin (is John Cusack miscast in that movie, or what?) and had the living daylights scared out of us by the Munchers (who probably were possums, or maybe cows, but in the pitch dark it sounded like they had long horns and blood-stained claws and spiky tails and glowing red eyes and six-inch teeth).
We also - and I wish to God I had a picture of this - locked the key in our cabin, and since it was too late to go and wake the good people who owned the place, Selina (being a good foot shorter and probably a foot less wide than me) had to climb in through the bathroom window, which measured approximately twenty inches square. It is testament to the extraordinary bendability of the Brits that we eventually got back in (out of reach of the Munchers) and into bed. Hallelujah.

Next day, after a strengthening breakfast of carrot cake, we headed to the Mavora Lakes.

The entrance to Milford Sound from the Tasman Sea.	Bob enjoying the scenery.
Thousands of silvery veins of rainwater find their way down the mountainsides and colour the fiord a deep jade green.	Rainbows sparking in the sun and wind.