Day 13 - March 4

Kia ora,

Today, we departed camp and drove to the Milford Sound boat cruise. We stopped to check out a waterfall along the way, and also saw a few keas on top of vehicles. Keas are a neat-looking green bird with red colors under their wings.

When we went out on the boat cruise, we had to deal with rain and fog. Milford Sound has been described as the eighth natural wonder of the world, but we unfortunately did not to see its full majesty on display.

The rainy weather continued as 9 of us embarked on the Routeburn Track. Fog and rain prevented us from seeing much of the scenery. The hike started uphill and we were on there for a little over 3 hours. When we reached our campsite, Sven (he is from Belgium and the person I would be sharing a tent with) and I discovered our tent did not have a waterproof cover - not an ideal situation for the weather conditions. Two of the girls in our group had the same situation with their tent. So, the 4 of us went to the warden and he let us pay for an upgrade into the hut. We were fortunate, because we thought the place had no available beds. It was also nice to have the shelter and get some of our clothes warm.Read more