12/6

On the way to Milford Sound we passed by some beautiful scenery and stopped at The Chasm and passed through Homer’s Tunnel.  The Chasm is a wonderful testament to the power of water, watching the flow vanish into darkness as it cuts its way out to the sound.

On the other side, we found our ship, the ‘Wanderer’, parked the car and got aboard.

We set off on our overnight trip into the sound.  We were extremely fortunate, it was dry the day we arrived and it rained overnight.  The sound was beautiful and lush and green on the way out.  We even saw penguins on the shore!  The way back was misty with waterfalls everywhere.  The Wanderer stopped at the deep underwater observatory.  The biosphere near this station is unique in that while it is only 10m deep, there is life here normally only found at 500m depth.  This is because the freshwater draining into the sound floats on the surface above the salt water and reflects a lot of light that would normally penetrate deep into the sea.  Here we saw black coral (it’s white when it’s alive).

Next we headed off for Te Anau.  The storm overnight brought some trees down on the only road leading out of the sound.  When we came upon the stopped traffic, I got out and spent awhile moving trees off the road with everyone else.  Trees are heavy!  After we cleared the road, we headed into town to the glowworm caves.  Gliding across the water on a little boat in the dark watching the glowing specks on the ceiling was a fascinating experience.  We came out of the cave and continued on to Invercargill where we stayed the night.

The next morning we headed to the Catlins and got a flat tire on the way.  Probably from the debris on the road after the storm.  We stopped briefly at Curio bay to see the petrified forest on our way to Cathedral caves.  You can only walk into Cathedral caves at low tide and our timing was off!  We tried to hike around to see what we could but we couldn’t get far.  So we went to the beautiful Purakaunui Falls then Nugget Point before going on to Dunedin where we stayed at Hogwartz.

After breakfast we did the Cadbury tour then went to the Otago Peninsula.  There we saw Royal albatrosses.  It’s tough to describe the scale of the albatross.  At the albatross observatory they had a wingspan model to give you an idea.

There was a farm with covered trenches that mazed across the property.  They were observation tunnels where you could walk and view penguins up close.  The penguins weren’t afraid because they could only see your eyes through the observation slits.  What an amazing experience!  We were unbelievably close to the penguins.  Better yet, when we asked for a suggestion for a place to stay the night, they said we could stay right there at the farm!  Everyone has a B&B in New Zealand!

The following day we drove by the world’s steepest street then Larnach castle before visiting the moeraki boulders.  Then we went to Fleur’s Place for dinner.  That night we stayed at Olive Grove.

In the morning, we took to the scenic highway toward Mt. Sunday.  Earlier in the week, we picked up a Lord of the Rings filming location book and picked some sites near our route to stop and visit.  We stopped at whitestone cheese in Oamaru then headed back to Christchurch to stay the night.  Before heading to the hostel we visited the Willowbank wildlife reserve where we saw Kiwi and Tuatara.

We stayed at a slightly older hostel and when Jenn took a shower, the steam swelled the door shut and she got locked in.  She pounded on the door for help, ‘Get my husband!’  Another guest answered, ‘what room?’  ‘He’s in Room F!’  This hostel had no room F- they were all numbered.  I think we were in room 3.  We had been in so many different places over the past two weeks it was pretty tough to remember things like that, especially in a laid back environment like the hostels.  In her panic, I think she turned the key and locked herself in, in addition to the door getting stuck.  Eventually I figured it out and freed my maiden in distress!

We had planned to take a hot air balloon ride but it was cancelled, so we visited the waipara wine valley to drown our sorrows before continuing on to Kaikoura.