Image: me at the viewing point for Rob Roy Glacier. The layer of ice on the mountain is the glacier. It looks like it could slide off at any time.
10 February 2023
Post 3 of 4
The roads on the South Island of New Zealand meander their way around lakes, hills and coastlines ensuring you can’t get anywhere too quickly but you always have a great view in the revision mirror. From the west coast, we headed east and south over the Haast Pass to Wanaka, Cromwell, Queenstown, Glenorchy, Kingston, around to Te Anau and up to Milford Sound. We visited wineries and laundromats, analysed and criticised farming practices, counted sheep, and did every walk we could find while the sun was out.
We enjoyed the national parks and the variety of walks, exploring mountains, rivers, creeks, lakes and the coastline. We also took every opportunity to swim in the gorgeous and COLD rivers and lakes.
My 2008 visit to Milford Sound had been on a bright sunny February day with a blisteringly cold wind. My 2023 visit involved an intensely wet day with air temperature 18 degrees and water temperature 17 degrees. The 2023 visit was way better. Photos don’t capture the movement, force, wind and drama of all the waterfalls – many that only exist when it is raining.
We were a bit crazy and kayaked on Milford Sound. It was the most dangerous thing we did on the trip. Rainfall in Milford Sound is measured in metres, so you can imagine the torrents that were charging off the mountains and the amount of debris coming with it, e.g. whole trees! Emma and I got back to base by kayaking like we were white water rafting, but the Singaporean tourists who’d never seen a kayak before had to be rescued as the swell took them out to sea…
Tourist numbers were intense at popular places like Milford Sound and then at Aoraki (Mt Cook) where the walking trail and campground were exploding with visitors. Being exposed to tourists again reminded me how not all cultures are compliant. We watched people ignore the fences protecting seal colonies to get so close to the seals that I was willing the seals to slap the stupid humans. We watched people swimming in glacier lakes next to big signs saying ‘No Swimming’ – and didn’t they get a fright when ENORMOUS wayward chunks of ice suddenly burst through the lake’s surface, dislodging from the glacier underneath in the hot sun. Scary.
The glacier lakes were dotted with amazingly shaped icebergs – looking down on the lakes it looked like someone had had a party and forgot to clean up. Emma and I spent some time glacier chasing, mostly losing to the dense white cloud clinging intensely to the peaks of Aoraki National Park. We managed to see 5 of New Zealand’s ~3000 glaciers. Unfortunately all the glaciers are disappearing rather quickly. On the west coast, I didn’t recognise Fox Glacier from my previous visit as it had retreated so much.
From Milford Sound, we headed south east and enjoyed the variety of scenery along the south coast. The wind on the coast was ferocious but the hikes and waterfalls of the Catlins were stunning.
A bit north of Dunedin, we stopped in Oamaru to visit my Kiwi family. Way back in 1996, Rosalie came on student exchange to live with my family in Australia and she’s been stuck with us since. Oamaru is a tourist destination in its own right these days and definitely worth a visit. The huge blue penguin colony is the star attraction, but the old town has been done up and Oamaru is the proud Headquarters of the Steampunk movement – think futuristic, industrial folk like in the Mad Max movies. And of course it was super fantastic to hang out with Rose and her fabulous family. Thanks Rose xx
