New Zealand

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We woke up still hurting. The bruise on my thigh had grown and blackened overnight and Matt’s hip was still very sore meaning he had to walk like an old man.

We’d been warned that the weather would turn later on today so headed to the gondolas (cable cars) straight after breakfast. The view on the way up the hill was incredible and we could already see the dark clouds coming towards us through the valley.

The dark clouds were looming so we went straight out onto the viewing deck to take our photos. When it started spitting with rain we went inside for some lunch rather than brave the luge ride in the wet. Once we’d finished eating the weather hadn’t really improved so we decided to go out for our ride anyway.

We grabbed a helmet and jumped into the chairlift that took us up higher to the start of the luge ride. We’d opted to just do one ride in an effort not to spend too much. You had to start with the scenic route first - if you bought more than one go you could up the adrenaline by going for one of the harder courses on your next attempt.

The hardest part was getting into the carts with our injuries. The guy at the start of the ride must have thought we were a real pair of crazies as we both slowly struggled to bend down and climb in.

It was really good fun weaving our way around the tight bends and down the hill, and had it not started pouring down we’d have probably paid for another go. We dashed indoors just at the right time as a moment later the rain came down so heavy that it sounded like thunder on the roof.

The downpour signalled it was time to leave so we got back into a gondola and headed down the mountain side. With the rain had come wind and the carriage swayed from side to side which was quite unnerving seeing how high up we were. It was coming down in sheets when we arrived at the bottom and didn’t look like it was going to let up any time soon, so we made an attempted dash back to the motorpark just down the road. I say attempted because I could only manage the occasional jog and Matt was still limping away on his poor hip. We got soaked.

After drying off we set out for Te Anau, which is where most of the Milford Sounds trips depart. The weather brightened up as we travelled and we managed to get a few photos en route, before arriving at the Te Anau i site. Our plan was to collect some Milford Sounds trip leaflets, pick which sounded the cheapest and best, and get it booked for the following day.

It wasn’t that easy. There seemed to be an endless number of tours available, all slightly different and not all of the leaflets included prices. We had to take a stack away with us and get booked into a campsite instead so that we could plough our way through them at a more leisurely pace. The trips all involved a coach trip to Milford Sound, a boat cruise for a few hours, and a coach trip back. We quickly realised that there were actually only four cruise companies, but lots of different coach companies were available to take you to the boats. Once we realised this it made deciding much easier and an hour later we’d found the cheapest one that included all of the extras we were looking for and booked onto it.

The rain caught us up from Queenstown at last and we spent the rest of the evening cooped up in our van with the fan heater going. It was the coldest night we’ve experienced here so far and the rain soon turned to hail and then sleet (apparently on the outskirts of town on higher ground they had two inches of snow!)

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