Category: Milford Sound

Today we pull up stakes in Milford Sound and start the long drive back through Fjordland National Park, past New Zealand’s second largest lake and curving back east toward Far South.

There’s no other way (by car/van at least) than backtracking the way you came in but it’s gorgeous and we’re well rested after two rest nights plugged in at Milford Sound lodge’s campervan section.

Discussion of the morning is how nice our campervan facilities have been at the holiday parks we’ve visited. They are inexpensive (compared to a hotel/motel) and have clean showers/bathrooms, group cooking and eating areas and comfy lounge areas to use wireless, read or meet people from all over the world. Fantastic way to travel – we are new fans!

We could get used to this. Seeing beautiful scenery every day while driving to a new location. We’re stopping at pull-out after pull-out to take in a snow-covered mountain, a waterfall, a carved-out valley. I don’t think I can capture the beauty in words except to say that it’s awe-inspiring at nearly every turn.

I had intended to build in more “Freedom Camping” on this trip (if you have a bathroom and running water you are considered “self-contained” and approved for camping off the grid).

But I also knew we’d be traveling in New Zealand’s high season, learning along the way that kiwis take to the road right after Christmas – which is today – and we are already seeing more travelers on the road.

Not quite trusting, we opt to call ahead to Lake Hawea for a plug-in space and stop by Lake Wanaka for lunch and sauvignon blanc, which of course we’re also becoming fans!

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It’s Christmas morning, and day 5 of our campervan adventure far from our Portland home. We’re now on the very Western edge of New Zealand’s South Island. It is as majestic as they say, and photos can’t capture all the pure natural beauty your eyes see.

I now have a new appreciation for waterfalls. And not your average waterfalls. It rained all night and into the morning as we donned our requisition where’s Waldo-striped long underwear and fleece, pulled over bright yellow rain jackets and tightened hoodies against the pelting rain.

A subtropical rainforest, Milford Sound gets a reported 3-9 meters of rain a year – and we were sitting in all that fresh water as we pushed our boats onto the Harrison Cove. All this top fresh water sits on top of ocean water coming in from the Tasman Sea way beyond where we’ll go today – at least in these boats.

The torrential rain has spawned all types of waterfalls raging down the sheer mountain walls – some a long single line following a crack the vertical length of the wall. Others a gusher that can’t wait to get to the sound below. Some look like flower dumped from up high, beads landing on outcrops, vegetation and then the pool below.

We feel spray and wind from one of the big ones and have to lean into the wind or be pushed over. These are just a few of hundreds in this sound, which is really a fjord since our guide tells us this area was in a U-shape from glaciers rather than rivers, which are cut into more of a V-shape. This is just one of 14 in Fjordland National Park.

Where it’s hard to see in the morning, an afternoon cruise takes us further out, past the same waterfalls of the a.m. but in the clearing sun they look different – less runoff but still majestic and unlike most Pacific Northwest waterfalls we’ve seen.

These are up close, enough to not just feel the spray, but nearly get blown over by it (AKA a “glacial facial” as they say).

In the sun, the sound looks like Tahiti or Kauai, where mountains jut straight up from the water and where the weather changes quickly. We are easily falling in love with this country and the immense, nearly untouched beauty and terrain we’ve seen over just the last few days.

Later, we are invited to a Kiwi Christmas dinner at the lodge and meet folks from the Bay Area, a suburb close to Portland, England, Australia, Singapore and much more. So nice to be outside the American culture for a bit.