Day 4
The alarm went off early. It must have been around 5:30am and I was checking the weather updates. The plan was to catch the 9:45am cruise, which meant leaving by 7:30am, the drive up to Milford Sound is a two-hour drive, even though it’s just over 100km. Sleep got the better of us and we decided to take the 11:45am cruise. So it was back to bed. Waking up in Te Anau Holiday Park was peaceful as it was pretty empty, a few other campers but the place was big!
We filled up the diesel and Monita got her caffeine fix before we made way for what I believe is one of the best drives this country has to offer. Once you enter Fiordland National Park, you are just left in awe of your surroundings. Mountains shoot upwards and you just feel so far removed. Weaving in and out of forests and through/next to mountains makes it hard to concentrate on the narrow roads. The road to Milford Sound is a state highway, and has some great history behind it. The coolest part has to be the Homer Tunnel that pierces its way through a mountain.
We arrived at Milford Sound with the most perfect weather. For a part of the country that receives almost five times as much rain as Auckland, blue skies and little wind made the gamble of driving up the night before so worth it! It was the second time I took the cruise, but the first for Monita. The commentary was the same, but the experience quite different. After the cruise we got back to the camper and had warmed up with some noodles before starting the journey to Queenstown.
A few photo stops along the way, and a sunset at Lake Wakatipu, we arrived in Queenstown. We pre-empted our empty stomachs and phoned ahead and ordered Ferg Burger. Instead of waiting half an hour just to place an order we strolled up, paid, and left with our haul. Monita's first Ferg went down a treat!
I wanted to camp beside Moke Lake, which probably wasn’t the wisest decision as it was so dark and road to the lake is gravel but we went anyway. We pulled up, threw the gas bottle on and blasted the heater.
