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April 9, 2006
Milford Sound
My day started off badly...to say the least. I spent a good half hour ripping through all my stuff trying to find my camera. Eventually I found it inside another bag in my backpack but the relief was short lived as I was now a half-hour late for my trip to Milford Sound. Luckily, it was still only 7am and the road there was not as bad or filled with traffic as many claimed. I cruised up there, doing my impression of Mario Andretti at times (just in flying around corners) and made it with minutes to spare. The drive is pretty crazy once you get near Milford as it is ridiculously hilly, the roads are narrow, and there's Homer Tunnel, which is awesome. It was carved out with only basice tools and over its 1.2km length it drops 120m in grade. Doesn't sound like much but a 10% grade is quite noticeable when you're driving on it.
Milford Sound is incredibly beautiful. It's actually a fjord, an area carved out by glacial movements that has now been filled up to a certain extent by ocean water. Visually, this means that you are constantly surrounded by cliffs and waterfalls. It's also a place that receives over 7m of rain annually and has 200+ days of rain every year. I was lucky in the fact that most of my tour was rain-free. 
It was cloudy when I was there but that only added to the almost ghost-like atmosphere of the place. The mountains climb right out of the water and keep going with some over 1600m in height! The waterfalls tumble down from 200m heights while dolphins swim by the edges of the cliffs.
The depths of the water is incredible. In the middle of the Sound it can reach 300m and there are points where travelling just a minute or two across the Sound results in 100m+ changes in the bottom. Even when almost close enough to the mountain walls to touch them, there was still 30m of water below the boat. As it happens often in this country I'm really at a lack of words to adequately describe the beauty. The pictures can hardly do the experience justice so I won't bother writing anymore.
Posted by Dr.Unk at April 9, 2006 12:33 AM
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