From what the locals said, you can't be here on a bad day. Milford Sound is different each time you visit. On a hot summer day, the sound looks completely different than a cold, snow capped winter. A rainy, misty day will also show off features that you couldn't see on a clear day. To my disappointment, we hit the rainy, foggy, cold day and it would test those complimentary remarks.
I was truly surprised by what I saw. The area made me feel like I was back in time during the age of dinosaurs. Imagine the movie Jurassic Park. That's what it looked like. Super cool! So many ferns everywhere with the fog just at the tree line.
The flat plains just before the sound is where many famous movies have been filmed (one battle scene in particular). In fact, New Zealand is the filming location of several well known movies:
Mission Impossible
The Lord of the Rings
The Hobbit
King Kong
Avatar
The Chronicles of Narnia
and yes, Jurassic Park
When we got to the inlet, we boarded a ferry that took us into the sound. Vertical mountains shot up all around us while we softly floated along the surface of the fresh/salt water mixed fiord.
Caught a picture of this good-looking guy.
With all the rainfall, there were literally hundreds of waterfalls. During the hot summer, you might find one or two. But there were so many in every direction!
Here's the little one with a waterfall on her head... :)
And a selfie...
Below you can see a seal basking on the large rock.
This picture doesn't do it justice, but it's a 360 panoramic of what it looked like. Just beautiful!
One last pic with my little one before we went inside the boat for hot tea.
On the bus ride back to Queenstown, we stopped at a river bend to see the Great Chasm. This provides a powerful visual of what water can do over time. The Cleddau River is melted snow/glacial ice that flows at incredible speeds from hard rock to softer bedrock. The result is lots of carved holes, circular indentions, and caves formed by erosion.
We also stopped to see a glacier on top of this cliff. Look closely... It has shrunk quite a bit over the years, according to our bus driver.
The final stop was a pure river flowing from that melting glacier above. Visitors are encouraged to fill their water bottles up with this crisp, healing water source.
One of the cool things about this bus tour was the bus seats. Notice the awesome name!
