Tuesday 31st March: Slightly cloudy and misty morning, sunny afternoon 5°C to 15°C
Milford Lodge to Queenstown: Milford Sound Cruise and Bus Cruise to Queenstown: 9am to 7.30pm
Accommodation: YHALakeside Queenstown
Mitre Peak Milford Sound
Sheer Granit Cliffs Milford Sound
Milford Sound
Milford Sound
Tasman Sea entrance Milford Sound
Milford Sound
Seal Rock Milford Sound
Kayakers on Milford Sound
Lady Boweb Falls
It's Cold on Milford Sound
Milford Sound
Milford Sound
Milford Sound
20 mins run to get red purse
YHA Lakefront kitchen
Highlight was the cruise around Milford Sound and the tourist-like bus trip back to Queenstown.
Ian's phone was bipping throughout the night with messages, alarms and alerts and kept me awake. We're up at 6.30am, long before the real alarm. Another hot shower before we pack and put on warm clothes ready for our 9am cruise. There's a storeroom where we can leave our backpacks until we return. Time for a cup of tea in the communal kitchen before heading off down the road to the cruise terminal where we collect our boarding passes. It must get busy as I counted 27 toilets in the Ladies room.
Our boat, the Spirit of Milford is a twin hulled catamaran, leaves right on 9am. This early cruise included a cooked buffet breakfast which is already spread out on the boat when we board. The buffet included sausages, scrambled eggs, baked beans, hash browns, toast and jams. It's a brilliant sunny morning with no breeze as we eat breakfast whilst cruising down Milford Sound towards the Tasman Sea. past several waterfalls and seals on rocks, with sheer granite cliffs on either side. The Captain gives us a running commentary of Milford sound, telling us it's really a Fiord carved out by Glaciers not rivers, and that Mitre Peak is named after a Bishops Mitre Cap. The morning is still crystal clear with just a hint of mist.
After breakfast, we go up on deck where it's freezing cold but spectacular. After 45 minutes, the boat U turns when it reaches the Tasman Sea and the trip back is even more spectacular than on the way out. 12 people are dropped off at Harrison Cove to go kayaking or to visit the Underwater Observatory. We're back at the terminal by 11am. A short 1.5k walk back to Milford Sound Lodge to retrieve our backpacks and wait for the 1.30pm shuttle bus back to the terminal to catch the 2.30pm bus to Queenstown.
At 12pm, we buy two real coffee’s which are luke warm and carrot cake which is not as good as Bonnie makes. Ian takes the two Cafe Latte's into the guest kitchen to be zapped in the microwave for a few minutes. At 1.30pm the shuttle bus appears and drops us at the ferry terminal where we don't have long to wait for the Tracknet bus. There's so many buses doing the Milford/Routeburn circuits, Tracknet, Kiwi Discovery, Info and Track, Real Journeys - and most times no matter who you book with you end up on another company's bus. It all seems to work and the buses are always full.
The trip back is as good as a scenic tour - through the 100 year old one way Homer Tunnel hand carved from granite, past the lower Holyford Valley to The Divide to pick up Routeburn Track hikers - just like us a few days ago, past Lake Gunn with a myriad of sheep and deer farms on the hillsides and valleys, then into Te Anau for a brief stop. The bust stop is somewhat out of town not where I had expected it to be and I had wanted to go across the road for a red purse I had earmarked a few days previously in Te Anau. But the bus is briefly returning to the town centre so I opt to get a ride back to town, run up the road to buy the purse from H and M Smith, then run back to get the bus with 5 minutes to spare.
The bus travels down the Eglington Valley and along a winding road beside the lake to Queenstown. It's 7.30pm when we arrive, just time to check out the MacPac store for a pack cover - but they don't have the right size and it's made from heavy weight material, not ultra sil - I'm very fussy now. Ian meantime has been to the bottle shop to buy a Marlborough Pinot Gris and a beer for dinner. A quick walk back to the YHA Lakefront in the cool of the evening to check back in, then down to the communal kitchen to finish off our left overs of Back Country dehydrated mince, dehydrated peas and potatoes, with bacon, tomato and cheese. Goes very nicely with our Pinot Gris.
After collecting our small bag containing our Chinese Laundry bag from the shipping container in the driveway, it's off to our room to re-pack and re-sort for the trip home. Already I'm planning a lighter pack for next time whether it’s Europe or New Zealand - two of everything, not 3.