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Background: The Polynesian Maori reached New Zealand in about A.D. 800. In 1840, their chieftains entered into a compact with Britain, the Treaty of Waitangi, in which they ceded sovereignty to Queen Victoria while retaining territorial rights. In that same year, the British began the first organized colonial settlement. A series of land wars between 1843 and 1872 ended with the defeat of the native peoples. The British colony of New Zealand became an independent dominion in 1907 and supported the UK militarily in both World Wars. New Zealand's full participation in a number of defense alliances lapsed by the 1980s. In recent years, the government has sought to address longstanding Maori grievances.

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By Eluned
October 8th 2009

Milford Sound + Gunn's Camp Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Fiordland National Park » Milford Sound

The Mirror Lakes

Day one of the Stray Adventure! Getting on the bus with a load of people who had already been on the bus together for ages was the tiniest bit strange. There's all these bus games about Spaceships and tractors or something? I have no idea if every Stray bus does them or if ours was just weird. On the way to Milford Sound to begin with, though stopped in Te Anau for an extremely delicious veggie pie. Mmmm. Then on a phote stop we ran into a Korean filming crew, making a documentary about the mammoths in the ice age (I [View Full Entry]

By LoYo
September 29th 2009

Doubtful Sound Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Fiordland National Park » Doubtful Sound

Doubtful sound

Last weekend I went on a cruise with my program to Doubtful Sound. I had already been on a cruise there with my mom but it is still just as impressive the second time around. We did an overnight cruise. The first day we cruised around for a while, and then went kayaking for about an hour, and then jumped off the cruise ship into the water. It felt like you jumped into an ice bath.....burrr. Later that day we saw tons of dolphins swimming and jumping out of the water. They would also ride the waves at the front of [View Full Entry]

By Kiro
August 7th 2009

The Sound of Silence Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Fiordland National Park » Te Anau

Mitre Peak reflects

The deafening sound of silence pierces Fiordland, only bird song and the crackle of logs on the fire may break the code of silence, the hush of Lake Te Anau lapping softly against the smooth pebbles of the inland beach and the wind whispers “By Eck It's Cold!”. The only element which didn't get the quiet memo was the rain ringing out in the night sky as it smashed down on our log cabin. Our little log cabin, over looking the ever changing mountain ranges, due to its ever changing weather. Our hostel was on huge acreage on a deer farm, [View Full Entry]

By Wanderly Wagon
July 13th 2009

Worlds No.1 Destination - Milford Sound Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Fiordland National Park » Milford Sound

The road to Milford

Tripadvisor.com had rated Milford Sound as the No.1 destination in the world. A huge accolade to receive, especially as it was voted for by the people. Tripadvisor also gets over 1 million hits per week and coincidently Galway was rated in the top 40 in the same poll. Although our guide said that Doubtful Sound was better and bigger with less tourists, we still had to see Milford for ourselves. We checked the weather conditions the night before and asked at our campsite about going. They said the road was open again but don’t go to early as the roads would [View Full Entry]

By Wanderly Wagon
July 12th 2009

Dolphins & Doubtful Sound Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Fiordland National Park » Doubtful Sound

Photo 5

Weather and a traffic accident would mean that we didn’t get to make it to Milford Sound. When we were having breakfast we heard sirens going of twice. We thought that maybe it signalled an avalanche or rock slide so while I was emptying the dirty water out of Ted, Michelle went to the office as to what the sirens meant. When she returned she said she had bad news. The sirens are a calling system for the fire brigade and emergency rescue personnel. A bus had crashed on the Milford road and it would be closed off until 12pm at [View Full Entry]

By cleanpairofeyes
June 10th 2009

Doubtful? Sounds Good To Me Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Fiordland National Park » Doubtful Sound

Doubtful Sound

The reason that I had ventured back into the mountains was to view the Doubtful Sounds. I have a habit of asking alot of questions when I am bored and I find somebody that works in tourism that looks bored. So at the i-Site in Stewart Island I had got into a good conversation with the lady who worked there. After the usual "This is nice and this is nice" she got down to business and just straight up told me to go to Doubtful Sound. This advice was accompanied with a five minute story of how much she enjoyed it. [View Full Entry]

By mans1503
April 17th 2009

Heaven! Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Fiordland National Park

I could have a bit of a lie in today as my trip was booked for 10.15am. I went to the post office first and bought a box to post my stuff home in. Unfortunately it seems the box itself cost about as much as filling it and sending it from Japan so it seems I am stuck with my stuff unless I can find a reasonable way to send it home... I caught the boat from Te Anau village up the Te Anau Lake. The guy was quite entertaining and knowledgeable about the area and said it was something like [View Full Entry]

By Stelen
April 6th 2009

Waterproofs essential Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Fiordland National Park » Milford Sound

Valley of a thousand waterfalls

Fact: Milford Sound has between seven and nine metres of rainfall a year and is considered one of the wettest places on the planet. Bear this in mind if you go to Milford Sound and take waterproof clothing with you. We thought that we would be on the bus all day, then on to a boat so it wouldn't really metter. We were wrong. To go from Queenstown to Milford Sound as a day trip does make it a very long twelve hour day but is well worth the effort. We were told that we wanted rain as this was the [View Full Entry]

By schlick33
March 25th 2009

fiordland NP Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Fiordland National Park » Milford Sound

lake wakatipu

mittwoch, 25.03.09 nachdem wir, will und ich, uns am dienstag dem 17.03.09 von der tour verabschiedet haben, fahren wir mit dem taxi zu unserer neuen bleibe für die nächsten drei nächte, dem bungie backpackers. zum znacht treffen wir nochmals margit und lena, die einzigen 'überlebenden' der tour hier in queenstown, für den legendären fergburger und lassen den abend im pub ausklingen... für den mittwoch haben wir eine lord of the rings tour ins paradise valley gebucht. früh am morgen werden wir von justin, unserem tourguide, vor unserem backpackers abgeholt und fahren entlang dem w [View Full Entry]

By Lisita
March 18th 2009

Mountains do Cry Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Fiordland National Park

Sailing into Milford Sound

How can words descibe landscape so beautiful it makes your eyes hurt? There's not much I can say about the past few days, I would like, instead, for the pictures to speak for themselves, although my cheap digital camera fails to capture even a tenth of the granduer. Just for some backround info though, this is how I got to witness such overwhelming natural beauty: After my stint of cycling to get to Christchurch, largest of the South Island's cities, I caught the bus down to Dunedin, a nice coastal town originally settled my Scottish whalers and miners (Dunedin is actually [View Full Entry]

Travel Blog » Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Fiordland National Park