We had 3 alarms set so we didn't miss our 8am boat trip to Doubtful Sound on Tuesday. The boat took us across Lake Manapouri, then we had a bus ride over Wilmotts Pass to another boat which we cruised on through Doubtful Sound. It was a great day out - the scenery was fabulous, the weather was good, we saw 2 types of penguins (including the Blue which is the smallest) and parrots. But the highlight was seeing the resident pod of dolphins who joined us for about 5 minutes, swimming in the bow waves and jumping in the boat's wake. Sightings are not guaranteed as the Sound is so large so we were lucky. In the photo the dolphin looks brown in colour but this is the tannin layer in the water caused by the sea water mixing with the fresh water. When the dolphins broke the surface they were the expected grey colour.
Fact learnt during the boat trip: New Zealand only has 1 indigenous mammal, the bat. All the others have been introduced and the possum (brought in for the fur trade) is classed as a pest. We were advised to run over any possum we saw to make it a 'squashum'.
We had thought we could only do 1 of the Sounds and chose Doubtful but, as we got back from the trip at 3.30 we decided to drive up to Milford Sound. We had been warned about the traffic on the road to the Sound but as we were very late all the traffic was coming out. We saw the majestic Mitre Peak, took some photos then went back down the road to a Department of Conservation (DOC) campsite. These are cheap but basic - they usually just have 'long drop' toilets but are in beautiful locations. Again it was lovely camping with just a few vans/tents in the darkness with the brilliant stars overhead.
On Wednesday we drove further down the road back to Te Anua stopping to do 2 short nature walks.
We then drove to Arrowtown for the night (proper campsite so we could have a shower).
Our plans change every day - it's a matter of balancing wanting to see as much as we can with exploring and hiking in each place. We decided to stop and explore this area rather than keep driving. So the next day we explored Arrowtown (old gold mining town) and Queenstown, then hiked for about 3.5 hours seeing no-one (lots of sheep though). We camped at a DOC site about 12km west of Queenstown on a lakeshore.
Queenstown is a vibrant place; full of youngsters looking for adventure. You can paraglide, skydive, power boat down a gorge, swing over a canyon and bungee jump.
Today we drove back to Wanaka and have stopped here on our way to the West coast as the weather looks fine for the Rob Roy glacier walk tomorrow.
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