The Milford Road

Hey Friends,

So after our 4 day hike of the Milford Track, we jumped on a bus in Milford Sound to take us back to our van at Te Anau Downs. The road was surrounded by stunning rock walls of mountains and  our bus went right through a mountain (the Homer Tunnel). We decided after a hot shower and a night at a holiday park that we would head back up the road and stay at a few campgrounds and see all the sights.

After a bit of a sleep in, we started back in the direction we came from the day before. It was a nice clear day again. FYI New Zealand is going through a bit of a drought these days which is awesome for traveling but not so great for the farmers as they are running out of grass for grazing. We first stopped in Eglington Valley. As most of the places in Fjordland, it was created by a large glacier that carved its way through the mountains. It used to be farmed but is now a part of Fjordland National Park. Quite a nice place.

We then stopped at Mirror Lakes. There was a bit of a breeze, but Roberta did manage to get some pretty good pics. I saw some trout feeding in the water which tempted me to throw a line in but there were too many people around.

We didn’t attempt any big hikes as I wanted to give my feet one more day of healing time. We took a short hike to Humbolt Falls which were around 280 meters high. Hard to believe they weren’t even half as high as Sutherland falls on the Milford Track.

We stayed at one of the many DOC campgrounds for the night. The creek beside the campground had Didymo AKA Rock Snot in it. It is an alga that was accidentally introduced into the South Island that they are trying to control the spread of. It definitely is not appealing to the eyes and it also suffocates out all of the natural stream flora.

It rained overnight and was still raining in the morning when we got up. This is the norm for Fjordland National Park. It receives around 7 meters of rainfall a year in some places. When it rains, hundreds of waterfalls are created because there is little soil on top of the rock. We decided to head for Milford Sound as there would be a lot more waterfalls. It was like a different place than when we had drove down the road two days before. There were many small waterfalls everywhere! It was awesome to be able to see it both on a clear day and on a rainy day as it is quite different.

The entrance to the Homer Tunnel

We stopped to hike to a place called the Chasm. The water from the river had eroded some cool shapes into the rock. Many spots had perfect circles carved from small eddies in the river.

We then continued on to Milford Sound. We decided to go on a cruise of the sound on a smaller boat at the end of the day to avoid the bus loads of people and since the weather forcast had predicted clearing it would allow us to see the tops of the mountains. In the meantime we went on a short hike around the waterfront going out onto a river delta.

When we first got on the boat it was still quite cloudy but the sun was trying to peek through the clouds. There were tons of small waterfalls coming down on the rock faces giving the whole place a mystic feeling. Quite an amazing place.

As the cruise went on the clouds lifted unveiling the huge mountains coming straight out of the ocean with waterfalls in every direction one looked. The skipper said they had all decreased in volume throughout the day, but it was the first time that one could see the top of the mountains. It was a magical place.

Mitre Peak-1692 m, in the background

Cruising around in the fjords we saw a few more seals. We were also lucky enough to see 2 Fiordland Crested penguins in the water and 1 on the rocks. Roberta was quite excited about that. They are quite cool looking with their double yellow mohawks. We were quite happy that we went on the cruise when we did. Being able to see all the waterfalls and the tops of the mountains is quite lucky.

Penguins swimming

Penguin preening itself

Once we finished the cruise we headed back up the Milford Road. The Homer Tunnel closes every night between 7 pm and 7 am because of the risk of not being able to see rockfalls if they do occur. We made it through the tunnel just before 7 and once again camped at a DOC.

The next morning I was feeling like I could hike again, so we decided to do the Key Summit track. It is at the start of the Routeburn Track and takes around 3 hours to complete. It was kind of cloudy when we started, but they soon lifted which exposed all of the mountains surrounding us. There was 3 different river valleys branching out to each of the west, south, and east coasts from the mountain giving it it's name. This is where the continental divide is. There was an educational alpine loop track that Roberta and I enjoyed at the top since we are both nerds and like our learning.

After that we headed back to Te Anau to get ourselves reorganized and take a much needed shower as there are none at the DOC campgrounds and we were starting to get a little gamey as they say.

Close up of a carnivorous alpine plant. P.S. I know I'm a geek.