Well, this is why one comes to Te Anau - to see Doubtful and Milford Sounds.
It rained all night. It rained this morning, It rained most of the day.
The Doubtful Sound tour starts of with a short bus ride from Te Anau to Pearl Harbour on the edge of the next door lake, Lake Manapouri. Then it's a 1 hour boat ride right down the lake to the end of West Arm, where you disembark and get ready for another bus ride. This bus ride is made possible because they had to put a road in from Doubtful Sound to Lake Manapouri so they could build a big hydropower station. Anyhow, the bus ride is slow and cautious, with good reason; the road is a greasy gravel track which gets washed away all over the place and has a sheer drop on one side the entire way. Finally after 45minutes or so you pull up next to another drop down to the water's edge. We all had to pile out and wait on the side of the road in the rain while the morning cruise people all came up the single file steel walkway and steps, and wait in the rain to get in the bus while we finished getting out.
The boat is very comfortable, a 30m catamaran and we settled down for another three hours on the water. Unfortunately there was almost no visibility with heavy cloud and rain and more rain. Actually, the rain turned out to be a bit of a blessing: lots and lots of temporary waterfalls to look at. Apparently they weren't there on this morning's cruise, and frankly, without them the day would have been pretty dull.
The highlight of the cruise seems to be poking our nose out into the Tasman Sea to look at some seals on Nee Islets, and then turning back to see it all again in reverse.
Here are some snaps:
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| Lake Manapouri, NZ |
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| Lake Manapouri, NZ |
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| Wilmot Pass, NZ |
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| Wilmot Pass, NZ |
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| Wilmot Pass, NZ |
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| A momentary bright spot on Doubtful Sound NZ |
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| A not so bright spot on Doubtful Sound NZ |
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| One of 10,000 waterfalls. Doubtful Sound NZ |
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| Shades of grey. Doubtful Sound NZ |
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| Doubtful Sound NZ |
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| Definite bright spot. Doubtful Sound NZ |
As an afterthought, here's what it should look like:
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| Doubtful sound. Photo from Real Tours Te Anau |
It does look lovely though, despite the rain!
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