New Zealand - Doubtful and Milford Sounds to Queenstown

[ExploringRTW]

26th February - 1st March

Doubtful & Milford Sounds to Queenstown.

For our first day in Te Anau we took a walk around town and did some surfing & shopping. We were surprised to find the ‘Sounds’ trips we wanted to do had already been booked out and/or were too expensive. Originally we’d hoped to do a overnight live-aboard trip on the Doubtful sounds and a day trip on the Milford sounds, based on some advice given to us. But bookings and prices were such that we decided to do the opposite and saved at least $NZ200 in the process. With Milford Sound being the busiest of the two, the advantage of seeing it when most of the other visitors had left also made it a very attractive solution. I left pleased with what I felt was a good overall decision that had a further added benefit of giving us a few days to sort out a number of outstanding issues.

In the end we spent the afternoon & early evening working on web updates and washing etc and had a nice evening chatting with other travellers in the camp kitchen.

The following day we spent at the campsite resting and sorting out the Darwin Insurance claim and other web related issues.

On the Thursday we set off for our Doubtful Sound trip. Sylvia got our luxury packed lunch together and we were off down to the jetty. We’d elected to take our own food over the offer of the boat companies own cuisine, as for what they were charging we had smoked salmon, a decent sparkling wine plus a whole host of other goodies. When we saw what the other passengers got for their money we were very pleased with the decision.

We were to travel on two boats today, one to take us across a lake to a land-based hydro electric power station which separated the lake we were travelling across form the beginning of the Doubtful Sound. The weather was overcast but dry when we set off, so the split between those who wanted to sit up on the open deck, and those inside was quite balanced. We elected to go upstairs, partly in order to maximise our photographic opportunities. This part of the trip was pleasant and we passed some of the time talking to a Geordie couple who’d emigrated to Australia.



One of our first views from the Lake.

Once at the end of the lake we boarded a coach which took us to the power station. The coach driver was very witty and made our time a lot of fun. The visit to the power station was interesting but a bit rushed for our liking. …just one more picture…..just one ………. What was the rush ?



An unusual picture of Sylvia and I just being.



A few interesting snip-its from the power station.





The generator room.

When we changed to the second boat, we were blown away. : It was beautiful, an absolute state-of-the art purpose-built cruiser which was also beautifully decked out, the sort you might expect to see the villain owning in a James Bond film. We purred away from the dock out into the sounds. Everybody had a seat either above or below deck and there were complimentary hot drinks. It really felt very special.



The best shot I managed to get of our second boat. Hopefully you can get some idea of how nice it was.

All the amateur photographers didn’t know what to do with themselves for the first half hour or so as none of us were sure what to expect and when or where to expect it !!. I in particular didn’t know whether to sit down for a ‘special’ moment or stand up at the side ready for a ‘special’ moment. That problem was partly solved by the arrival of some rain about 45 mins into the trip. Initially it wasn’t too bad but by about an hour or so in it was foul and had become very windy so a lot of people moved into cover under the deck. Around this time I ‘found’ myself at the bow of the boat being amused by a young couple who were messing about leaning into the not inconsiderable wind. It was very amusing to watch and so I joined in too. At this point there were just the three of us out on the bow deck with a fair number of amused (but dry) spectators !! Sylvia also decided to join us after a while and we all had a good laugh fooling about.



A few shots of Doubtful Sound.






Just a slight breeze........



....or is it the begining of a new dance craze ?

Near the sea-entry end of the sound we were able to watch some fur seals on some rocks. In the end it rained for half of the time on the Doubtful Sound itself. The Sound is beautiful but I can’t say that we were especially captivated once we’d become aclimatised to the feeling of remoteness and the repetitively similar looking surroundings, ……..and I’m glad we didn’t spend any more money on the trip !

Once we were again travelling back on our first boat across the lake it soon stopped raining, although it was now fairly cold. We, along with a few others decided to stay up on the top deck again. The views were very nice and although cold, gave us a final opportunity to take our last few pictures.

That night it rained for most of the time and when we awoke the following morning the rain continued. Under normal circumstances we’d have stayed and there would have been no real problem But today we were to take our Milford Sound boat trip late afternoon which necessitated driving up to another point some 100 or so km’s away and so we had to pack away. The weather really was foul, the tent was soaking and it was miserable packing everything away. In the end I took everything out of the tent and gave it to Sylvia in the camp kitchen whilst I packed away the soaking tent.

Once packed up we donned our wet-suits and this was the first opportunity me to try out my new Dri-rider over-suit I’d bought in Christchurch. As we would be staying overnight on a boat we’d both prepared exactly what we would require for our time on board to minimise the amount of gear we would take as we knew space to be very limited.

It rained for the whole journey up and it was wet..wet..wet. At one point we had to wait at a set of traffic lights which controlled the traffic going through a tunnel. Whilst we were waiting, a Kea, a native and very destrutive bird(see my entry elsewhere for Lake Punakaki for another tale) started attacking the tyres on the cars waiting. About 10 mins later we went through the long man-made-very poor road surface-poorly lit tunnel. The views you get when you exit were magnificent-there were waterfalls everywhere. Donald , a New Zealand friend we had made, had told us it would be good but nothing could really prepare us for this. The only real shame was that the weather was so bad we didn’t really want to stop and take any pictures.

When we arrived and started to disrobe I see a very nasty tell-tale wet circle impressed upon the front of my what were ‘dry’ clothes. Hmmm, yet another non-waterproof ‘waterproof’ - My arms were also wet. How hard can it be to develop a waterproof suit for motorcyclists ? All that is surely required is the material Sou-westers are made of, a bit of elastication here and there and you’re set. I used to have a one-piece Rukka suit made of similar stuff. Never leaked in over 10 years and only cost me about £50 in the late 80’s. I couldn’t easily access any other dry clothing due to our set-up on the bike and so I had to keep my wet thing son. Lovely !! Remember the 'wet'-suit name : 'Dri-rider' !

The ferry company, ‘Real Journeys’, were very helpful and allowed us to park the bike right next to their offices and leave our wet riding gear actually in their offices which was great.

Our boat for this trip, was by comparison to Doubtful sounds, a small little quaint old boat from yesteryear. It was called the MV Friendship, was Real Journeys first ever boat back in the 70’s and was only big enough to sleep 12 plus the 2 crew.

Once we set off, we were much more impressed with Milford than Doubtful. Everything was much more dramatic and interesting right form the outset. We saw one huge waterfall and then waterfall after waterfall after waterfall. We were told that the best time to see the Sounds was either when it was raining or had just stopped….it had just stopped so we had the maximum opportunity for dramatic photographs whilst being able to keep dry.



Everything was much more dramatic and interesting right form the outset on Milford.







Once we’d visited the sea-entry point of the Sound (i.e. the other end), we returned to our anchorage point for the night. Once settled there, we were offered the opportunity to take some kayaks out along the edge of the Sounds to look out for seals and to generally investigate the area. Normally I would have gone but on this occasion I decided to keep Sylvia company on an aluminium tender boat. Our trip was pleasant and even allowed us to see a few seals along our way.



From here on for a screen or few I have included 'some' shots of the numerous waterfalls we saw.



With..............



.....................and without wind effects !!!





The power contained within them was phenominal !











Sylvia (and I) loved the remoteness, isolation and awesomeness of Milford sound. It really was that spectacular !







Please note the size of the boat at the bottom of the waterfall....it may help you with perspective !!

For dinner we had a barbeque which had been prepared whilst on our ’inward/return’ journey. I was amazed it could be accomplished on such a small boat but it was, and it was excellent. Steaks, chicken, sausages, salad. It was all there and followed by some lovely desserts.



Our barbequed dinner. Hmmm...yes-sir-ee, that'll do for me !!



We shared a few conversations with other guests over dinner and wine, Sylvia in particular enjoyed some time chatting to another Swiss couple.

Around 11pm most of us were tired and started retiring to bed. All beds were bunk beds and there were only about 2 bunks which were wide enough and accessible enough for your average person. We hadn’t chosen ours very quickly and hence had the bijou & compact bunks. To get in the top one was a gymnastic feat and was a non-starter for Sylvia, especially with her arm still being broken. I managed to contort my body to the various positions required to get in to bed but was then faced with ‘my’ ceiling being about 9-12”s away from my face. I can suffer quite badly from claustrophobia and so my first desire was to jump straight back out again, however if there is one thing this trip has taught me, it is to use your head and rationalise what is going on. That, and the prospect of where would I sleep anyway managed to keep me in bed long enough for the horrible feeling to pass. During the night however I needed the toilet and so had to repeat my 'Houdini' act from earlier but tired and in the now darker ‘room’. Fortunatley all went ok although I was surprised to find the same claustrophobic feelings hitting me once back in my bunk. I repeated the same rationalisation as before and fell back to sleep.



Me in my Houdini bed - The nose to ceiling dimension of between 9-12" may not look too hard but with the bed base being about 4'6" off the floor, the feat to position myself in order to get into my bunk without knocking myself out was challenging.

Come morning, we both managed to get enough sleep and set about getting scrubbed up and ready for breakfast. We had all you could want for breakfast, fruit, fruit juice, cereals, bacon, sausages, scrambled eggs, toast and so on. Again, the food was excellent.

After breakfast we went for a much wetter (as it was raining again) shorter trip to see some of the Sounds sights including some beautiful waterfalls, before returning back to the harbour at around 9-10am.



The view from our anchorage point.



Yes, that is a Glacier you can see on the top.

It was an excellent trip and we understood it to be one of the last using the MV Friendship, which is shame, because it lived up to it’s name in a way that a larger vessel never could.



The 'Friendship'.

We go back to the offices of ‘Real Journeys’ and collect our gear and get ready to be back on the bike again. It’s now pouring with rain in a way that even we British would be shocked !!!

On our route back towards Te Anau we saw one car being dragged out of a ditch. The occupants looked ok so we carried on riding to Te Anau where we had a coffee and an early lunch.

As we set off again towards Queenstown, our next destination, we saw a steam train about to leave and then leaving from its station. It was a nice break and an opportunity to get our wet suits off. Incidentially I‘d wondered if I hadn’t fastened my over-suit properly on the way to Milford Sound and so had carefully checked that every zip, flap and bit of Velcro was tightly fitting before we‘d left. Surprise surprise I ’d still got wet. (Later we discovered that riders in the know call these suits ’Wet-rider’ obviously spoofing their real ’Dri-rider’ name.)

We finally arrived at Queenstown with my left indicator being stuck on (the only way to disable it was to hold the cancel button in permanently)-the right side wouldn’t work at all unless it was operated as a Hazzard light.

We were going to camp at a ‘Top Ten’ campsite in the town but after unwrapping our soaking wet tent from two days ago at Te Anau we decided we should try and find a cheap room. We did finally find one in the end at a ‘Top Ten’ campsite at the Shotover river. We managed to get a really nice room with en-suite facilities and we were very happy to be warm & dry.

Mike.