Queenstown and Milford Sound

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First of all, congratulations again to Fem and John on the arrival of baby Isabella!


So we left you last when we had just arrived in Queenstown, the adventure and extreme sports capital of New Zealand. First of all lets talk about the food. For any backpacker in New Zealand, Queenstown is synonymous with the Fergburger. After extreme sports and extreme drinking, extreme eating is a must. These burgers will sate even the most mammoth of appetites. The Big Al alone could feed an entire 3rd world country for a week.


Since we were trying to avoid leaping off high objects attached to elastic in an effort to stop spending money so rapidly we still had to get the adrenaline pumping somehow and headed into the mountains to Cardrona to try snow boarding. We took two lessons and although we were either on our arses or falling face first 80% of the time we picked it up right at the end of the day - how annoying, I get really impatient not being able to do things straight away, anyway, we were going to go back the next day but our bodies were too battered and bruised and I could barely lift my arms above shoulder level.


For our last two days on the south island we decided to head to Milford Sound, considered by some to be one of the natural wonders of the world. We stopped off to spend the night at Te Anau, a strange little town between Queenstown and Milford - think 'middle of nowhere' then triple it. Our rental car can't be more than five years old yet has a tape deck, we found a used book and record store that sold cassettes and tried to find some oldies but goodies but there wasn't much other than Janet Jackson, Bing Crosby or Westlife. Actually, there was a Star Trek tape but I hid that, sorry David.


There is a definite issue in New Zealand with regards to being spoilt. You cannot be exposed to such stunning natural wonders on a totally consistent basis without starting to become a little numb to them. You still appreciate it, but on Milford, surrounded by hundreds of waterfalls cascading down 1000 meter high mountains with dolphins following our boat we both felt that we should have been more wowed than we were. Regardless of this negativity and our expectations being at an unrealistic level it was still very beautiful. For the geography buffs out there Milford Sound is actually not a sound but a fiord, basically a sound is calved out by river erosion, where a fiord is calved out by glacial erosion.


Driving back to Queenstown we had an awesome view of the stars again, I kept thinking back to Australia and how crocodiles can navigate their way home using the stars, clever things. Arriving back in Queenstown felt like coming home again, the wood fires were burning, scrabble was being played, people were huddled round the dinner table sharing stories. Grudgingly we left Queenstown for Auckland this morning, you could really spend at least 4 weeks going round the south island.


You have to love this country with its enormous mountain range, pristine beaches and glaciers in-between. From palm trees to snowcapped mountains you feel like going summer to winter and back again in a few hours.. Love this country! “Sweet as”, as they say round these parts.


David's favourite quotes:
"It's too cold"
"Why do we need to get up so early"
"That radiator better be on"

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Photos

Milford Sound
A perfect U shaped valley. This trip got all the memories of school geography classes flooding back! Massive 512 meter deep U shaped valleys and truncated spurs!!

Cardrona
This was the typical pose of the day

Comments

[Graeme]

Mrs Biggins...
Would be pwoud.... did you have your wubber wooler and dwawing pencil david?