Fresh off the Routeburn Track, we continued to make our way deeper into no-cell-phone-reception territory, towards Milford Sound. I write 'fresh', but take that with a big pinch of salt after three days of hiking without shower facilities.

On the way to Milford Sound, you have to pass through Homer Tunnel. Waiting times to enter the tunnel are up to 15 minutes. This creates a line of traffic and impatient tourists, which is exactly what gets a kea's attention. This big parrot will happily scoot over to your car, examine the windshield wipers reeeeaaaaalll close, and possibly shred them to bits. They're heavy too, so they produce an ominous tapping when walking on top of your car. Step out of your car to take a photograph, and it will try to do the same thing with your shoes so we saw more people running away from the birds rather than taking a picture of them.

Rudyard Kipling labeled Milford Sound as the eight wonder of the world after being stunned by the beauty of this natural, glacier carved landscape. Technically, that makes it a fjord (U-shape, created by glacier) and not a sound (V-shape, created by river), but nobody wants to reprint all those tourism books, maps, leaflets and road signs, so Milford Sound it is. According to Maori legend, Milford Sound was really too good to be true. The gods, therefore, created the sandfly and populated the Milford area with heaps of them, to remind the people not to stay and linger.

There are two types of weather that bring out the best of Milford Sound. Heavy rain will create thousands of waterfalls cascading from the steep cliffs, but will obscure just how high said cliffs are. Clear skies, on the other hand, let you appreciate the grandeur with magnificent vistas, but without waterfalls. Whatever type of weather, there is a 99% chance you can't capture your awe on photo.

It was hard to wrap our head around just how big it is during our boat trip down the fjord. Mitre Peak stands 1,6 km above the water level, and who knows how deep it plunges below the water. That is 2,3 times higher than the Signal de Botrange, the highest point in Belgium. It takes a while to get to Milford Sound, and it really is full of sandflies, but there's a reason why this usually is one of the few places that someone has already heard about before actually visiting New Zealand.

Next, we wanted to get up close to Mount Cook, Lake Pukaki and Lake Tekapo. Only a good 250 km from Milford Sound as the crow flies, but a 530 km drive because of mountains. Driving up to the Hooker Valley where we wanted to hike the similar named Track, it looked like there was a clear break in the clouds down the Tasman Valley where we were driving to. Unfortunately, the thing about mountains is that there can be sunshine and happiness in one valley, but the one adjacent to it will be filled with mist and disappointed tourists. That latter valley was the Hooker Valley. With the beautiful scenery shrouded by the mist, we opted to go to the sunny valley, which contained the Tasman Glacier. There's something to say about your Plan B still being this spectacular. We were just bummed we couldn't hike the Hookey Valley track.

Not doing the Hooker Valley walk gave us plenty of time to marvel at the blueness of Lake Pukaki. I reckon that it's just the reservoir of blue paint that they use to dye all of the rivers and other unwordly colored water in New Zealand. Lake Tekapo has the same shades of blue and is much more photogenic than its neighbor. You can either (a) try and fail to take a picture with the picturesque Church of the Good Shepherd without any tourists in the shot, (b) Use the lupine flowers for even more color in your picture, and/or (c) go up to the Mt. John Observatory for a birds eye perspective. We did all three. There's a coffee shop up at the Observatory called the Astro Cafe, where you can spend hours gazing at 360° views of Lake Tekapo and the mountains in the distance, and they have great snacks. So there's that as well.

A lot more driving and a cancelled whale watching tour in Kaikoura put us in Nelson to finish this week. The self-proclaimed sunniest place of New Zealand. A perfect region to grow grapes and make wine as well. Instead of driving from winery to winery and only getting Caroline drunk, a tour was a better option. Pickup at 11am, and before lunch we had already tasted about 16 different wines. The grandma that served us our first wines of the day talked about 'how built up' this place is getting. All we could see were vineyards and sheds, the closest house was across the bay. The tapas plate we had for lunch seemed more suitable for an afternoon snack, and was not the big meal we had hoped for, and desperately needed. Consequently, the afternoon, with some 8 more wines to taste, was a LOT of fun. Since we finished drinking at 5PM there was no hangover standing in the way to drive back to Kaikoura for the start of our last week in New Zealand!

Geschreven door BigTrip