The next day we flew to Queenstown, finalized our logistics and enjoyed the afternoon there. Here's the view of Lake Wanaka from downtown Queenstown.
I visited the Kiwi Birdlife Park. Finally got to see Kiwis up close, albeit behind glass and I also enjoyed the Park's replication of an early Māori hunting village. Ended the day with a superb and very reasonably priced dinner at the Rees Street Deli and a gorgeous sunset over the lake. Note that the last two pictures were taken within minutes of each other.
On the 30th we set off by bus to the Routeburn Shelter where, by 11 am we were starting the first of our 3 nights on the Routeburn Trail. It can be done either way starting where we did or at “the Divide.” We spent the first night at the Routeburn Falls Hut, our second at MacKenzie Hut and third at Lake Howden Hut. A fit person could do the walk in two nights, three days, (it’s only about 35 km) but Robin and I both like to savour all the natural beauty and enjoyed, on the last day, taking the side trail up to Key Summit for great views and an interesting bog environment. We did not get to do the side-trip, the second day, up Conical Hill because it was closed due to avalanche risk.
Despite this closure we were amazingly lucky with the weather. Gorgeous days – fantastic views. The only clouds we saw were the morning of the second day climbing up from Routeburn Falls and through a heavenly boggish area. As we rested for a bit, we watched the clouds burn off and reveal the spectacular circle of snow covered mountains surrounding us.
Another joy was the stars at night. We were there during a new moon, so the stars sparkled brilliantly, although the days were so long that after the first night of waiting up til 11:30 for the sky to get dark enough, we tended to star gaze when we got up in the wee hours to pee. Saw the Magellanic Clouds, which are other galaxies that orbit the Milky Way and are only visible from the Southern Hemisphere. Also saw shooting stars most nights.
We’d arranged to be picked up at the Divide in the afternoon of our 4th day with Real Journeys to take us to their Milford Sound Cruise Ship. Unfortunately the folks that I’d cruised with on the Doubtful Sound don’t operate in Milford Sound. We signed up for the more economy boat, but got upgraded to their luxury boat because their economy boat was booked by a school group – no worries, as a New Zealander would say.
The boat holds about 70 people, but was only ½ full, so we enjoyed the luxury, lack of crowd, and the continued clear weather. Despite it’s name, Milford is not a sound, but a fiord who’s walls rise vertically some 300 metres from the sea floor to the surface of the water, and continue more than 1700 metres above the fiord to glaciers and craggy peaks.
We boarded at 4 pm with a good 5+ hours of sunlight we cruised out to the coast where we anchored and got on a tender (small motor boat) got up close with Fiordland Crested Penguins – amazingly as they’re almost all gone to sea for the summer. These are the same as the penguin played by Robin Williams in Happy Feet. We also saw a couple of pods of dolphins before we returned to the larger boat for a good dinner. After our tramp, it was lovely to be so pampered.
The boat anchored for the night in Harrison Cove. Early morning we had a hearty breakfast as the boat cruised back out to the coast and went far enough into the Tasman Sea that we got a good sense of the coastline of Fiordlands. Back into the sound for a 9:00 drop off at the Milford Sound Underwater Observatory which is suspended off the wall of glacier laden Mount Pembroke.
We learned that Milford Sound offers a unique marine environment with many, usually deep water, rare species, living quite close to the surface, due to a tannin-darkened fresh water layer that lies on top of the salt water fiord. Here visitors descend 10.4 meters, the equivalent of a four storied building. We saw red and black coral, anemones and sponges, scarlet wrasse, snake stars, star fish, sea cucumbers, and tube worms.
We caught another Real Journeys bus after the cruise to Te Anau (2ish hours away). They have the coolest buses I’ve ever been on. They are specially designed for sightseeing in the fiordlands, where one wants to see as much above as at eye level. The buses have glass ceilings, theater seating that gets higher the further back you are in the bus and… the bus is wider in the back than the front, so everyone can see really well.
On the bus an Australian man overheard Robin and me realize that both of our grandfathers were Dartmouth men. He asked where we were from and it turned out he had a joint appointment at the University of Canabeara and Duke! We ended up having dinner with him and his wife at the superb Fat Duke Café in Te Anau. Excellent sustenance for the next day's start of our second tramp.
We caught an 8:30 am boat across Lake Te Anau to the base of Mount Luxmore to start the Kepler Circuit, about 60 km. We weren’t quite as lucky with the weather. A rainstorm came in just after we finished our first days hike and persisted through the night. By morning it had petered out, but the second day, which is almost entirely on ridge lines with vast views on both sides, was a clouded in. While disappointed, we really enjoyed the diverse and beautiful alpine plants and felt as though we were in a special bubble as all was white beyond 50 feet circumference around us -- ethereal.
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| View from Mount Luxmore Hut before the rains started |
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| what we saw from the ridge line -- alpine flowers and mounds of moss. |
At night we heard Kiwi and Ruru/Morepork owl calls at night and, the next morning, we walked up to a waterfall and were treated to a sighting of the rare Blue Duck. Robin heard it’s call, too, which is more of a whistle, than a quack.
The good weather resumed for our third day, mostly flat, but still lovely walk to Moturua Hut on the shores of Lake Manapouri where we couldn’t resist a swim, despite the frigid water. Learned that some claim that cold water helps tired muscles – worked for us.
We walked all the way back into Te Anau on our last day. On the walk to Rainbow Bridge, we got a spectacular view of a pair of New Zealand falcons feeding their baby, 10 meters away almost at eye level because they were up a tree that was at the bottom of a cliff. The walk after Rainbow Bridge was missable so if you do it and are short on time, go for the bus pick-up at Rainbow Bridge. It is also possible to walk directly to Rainbow Bridge from Iris Burn forgoing the stay at Moturua Hut, if your time is limited.
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