Day 10: Milford Sound
Our trip just keeps getting better and better! Today blew our mind away… AGAIN! Just when we thought we had seen the most amazing things, we find something new that completely takes our breath away!
Today, we drove toward Milford Sound, another end-of-the-road town like Aoraki/Mount Cook. The drive was, once again, spectacular. On the five-hour drive, we passed through so many different landscapes, and we kept getting surprised with new and amazing things to photograph! It was like every turn held a new gift! We drove through windy mountains, stopped for a herd of sheep crossing the road to go grazing, saw deer farms (apparently a big thing in this area), passed by a town with a whopping population of 72, drove through tufts of clouds, watched rivers raging below us, walked through a rainforest, watched a chasm carve out a path through large boulders, witnessed hundreds of waterfalls dropping from miles high, and saw enormous mountains and cliffs end in lakes all around us. And that was just the drive!
This time, instead of a glacier, the road ended in a Sound (also known as a Fjord), which is a narrow inlet that snakes its way through the mountains from the sea. It is hidden between the mountains so you cannot see it from the sea (some early explorers didn’t find it, even after several voyages).
We checked into our hotel in the middle of the mountains, and then went to the bay to join our cruise through Milford Sound. Once again, there are no words to describe our experience. The cruise took us through the sound, through a hidden oasis of mountains, rainforests, waterfalls, and sea animals (dolphins, sea lions, and birds)! We saw another rainbow (another full one, from one end to the other), watched dolphins swim and jump by our boat, were soaked by a waterfall, saw sea lions sleeping on a rock, watched the sun set through the mountains, and had lost complete function of our awe by the end of it all (actually, we had lost that at the beginning of our day)!
We still can’t believe it. Each day, our jaw hurts because we are perpetually dragging it along with us everywhere we go! Everything we see just gets more amazing than the last thing! It almost feels so unfair to write blog entries about all of this beauty because unless you see it with your own eyes, you cannot comprehend just how breathtaking it all really is! We cannot even imagine going back to a “regular” life after all of this – and we’re only at the beginning of our trip! The one thing we keep feeling every day is how unbelievably lucky we are to be having this experience. We are so fortunate. We are so privileged. We are so blessed. And “Thank You” are the only two words we have managed to say that mean anything.
Our trip just keeps getting better and better! Today blew our mind away… AGAIN! Just when we thought we had seen the most amazing things, we find something new that completely takes our breath away!
Today, we drove toward Milford Sound, another end-of-the-road town like Aoraki/Mount Cook. The drive was, once again, spectacular. On the five-hour drive, we passed through so many different landscapes, and we kept getting surprised with new and amazing things to photograph! It was like every turn held a new gift! We drove through windy mountains, stopped for a herd of sheep crossing the road to go grazing, saw deer farms (apparently a big thing in this area), passed by a town with a whopping population of 72, drove through tufts of clouds, watched rivers raging below us, walked through a rainforest, watched a chasm carve out a path through large boulders, witnessed hundreds of waterfalls dropping from miles high, and saw enormous mountains and cliffs end in lakes all around us. And that was just the drive!
This time, instead of a glacier, the road ended in a Sound (also known as a Fjord), which is a narrow inlet that snakes its way through the mountains from the sea. It is hidden between the mountains so you cannot see it from the sea (some early explorers didn’t find it, even after several voyages).
We checked into our hotel in the middle of the mountains, and then went to the bay to join our cruise through Milford Sound. Once again, there are no words to describe our experience. The cruise took us through the sound, through a hidden oasis of mountains, rainforests, waterfalls, and sea animals (dolphins, sea lions, and birds)! We saw another rainbow (another full one, from one end to the other), watched dolphins swim and jump by our boat, were soaked by a waterfall, saw sea lions sleeping on a rock, watched the sun set through the mountains, and had lost complete function of our awe by the end of it all (actually, we had lost that at the beginning of our day)!
We still can’t believe it. Each day, our jaw hurts because we are perpetually dragging it along with us everywhere we go! Everything we see just gets more amazing than the last thing! It almost feels so unfair to write blog entries about all of this beauty because unless you see it with your own eyes, you cannot comprehend just how breathtaking it all really is! We cannot even imagine going back to a “regular” life after all of this – and we’re only at the beginning of our trip! The one thing we keep feeling every day is how unbelievably lucky we are to be having this experience. We are so fortunate. We are so privileged. We are so blessed. And “Thank You” are the only two words we have managed to say that mean anything.
Mirror Lakes, on the way to Milford Sound
Waterfall, rainbow, dolphins... heaven
Milford Sound
Sunset in the Sound
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