Milford in Rain & Sun

The next day, we got an early start to head towards the Fiordland area, home of Milford Sound. First off was a 2 hour drive to Te Anau, where we needed to pick up our hiking passes. The drive was gorgeous: we drove by the "Remarkables" mountain range, along Lake Wakatipu, and then through the green countryside. Brittany was getting used to driving on the left hand side nicely.

At the park ranger station, we found out that the park was expecting lots of rain and snow at elevations greater than 1000 meters the next day, when we were scheduled to start our hike. While we brought cold weather gear, we certainly weren't expecting this in the New Zealand summer.

After lunch, we pushed on to Milford Sound on the famous Milford Road. We saw colorful shrubs, open fields of wildflowers, and prominent peaks obscured by the clouds. There were thousands of temporary waterfalls rushing down the mountain sides. It was pouring but we arrived just in time for the last cruise departure. Outfitted in all our rain gear, we climbed aboard with expectations that we wouldn't see much.

We were sitting inside initially as the guide pointed out some of the waterfalls. After drinking a cup of hot tea, we decided to check out the view from the top of the boat. Being surrounded by the majestic mountains jutting out of the water on all sides, some upwards of 4000 ft, shed new light on the experience. We stayed up top until we got all the way to the Tasman Sea. On the way back, the captain pulled the ship very close to one of the larger waterfalls and urged everyone to experience the power from the bow. Fortunately the rain gear kept us mostly dry. As we headed back to the dock, the clouds started breaking and we got a better view of the fjord.

As we were leaving, the sun came out, making for some fantastic scenery on the return drive.Read more