Chunninghams in Taupo: South Island Days 4-5

We left Queenstown and headed south to Te Anau and Fiordland National Park. Fiordland is full of fjords that are called sounds. Not that it makes a single bit of difference, but the sounds were called sounds by the early Europeans. Later geologists realized the role of glaciers in the formation of these deep sea inlets and used the term fjord to describe the phenomenon. No one likes a J next to an F, so the Kiwis named the sound-filled region of their country Fiordland. Go figure. Thankfully, the sounds are awesome and don't care what people call them.

Heading south, we stopped at the southern tip of the south arm of Lake Wakatipu. It was cold and windy, as you can see by Evelyn and Aidan's attire:

Here is a shot up the lake, showing the cloudy sky.

Once we reached Te Anau in Fiordland, we did a short walk along the Waiau River, just south of Lake Te Anau. We had to first cross a bridge:

Here is the river. At this point, I think I've read claims that half the rivers in New Zealand were used to depict the River Anduin in LOTR. This is one of them.

This was a troubling sign:

Jasper followed instructions:

Aidan got a good stick, just in case, but carried it beside him instead of over his head.

Cool ferns in a cool forest:

Here we are in the forest. The trees were very different here than they were in the North Island. They are called beech trees, but they didn't look like beech trees I had seen before. I found out later they are called Southern Beech and have the genus name Nothofagus, which means fake beech. Why does the northern hemisphere get real beech trees and the southern gets fake? I'd be angry if I was a Nothofagus.

Another shot of the river. Okay, it does look kind of like the Anduin.

Here are some angry trees:

The next day, we headed out to Doubtful Sound for an overnight cruise. First, we took a boat across Lake Manapouri. Doubtful Sound is hard to get to. You have to go to Manapouri, take a boat across the lake, and then take a little bus across the pass to the sound. Here is Jasper:

And here is Aidan and Evelyn:

We stopped in the pass and looked down at the sound. The sky was very overcast.

It was clearer in the sound. Here we are waiting for our boat to come to the dock. Ours is the boat way in the background behind Evelyn.

The boys thought the boat was awesome. The cruise was not full, so there were only two other passengers besides us. Here is our eating table in the main cabin.

Here is their awesome room with bunk beds and a portal to look out of:

Jasper is happy...

...to see himself!

The cruise was quite amazing. The views were beautiful and the entire trip had a timeless quality, as if we were suspended between the ancient time of the sound's creation and the modern world. We mostly just boated around, fishing and kayaking and enjoying being out on the deck as the walls of the sound slipped by.

It was hard to stop taking pictures of waterfalls. I find it ironic that I have such a need to photograph a waterfall when what makes a waterfall so intriguing is the constant motion of the water over the cliffs and rocks and moss. A photograph freezes exactly what is so entrancing when viewing a waterfall and reduces the endless shifting of water and light to a single image that can only suggest the experience of actually being in the presence of such a natural wonder. Despite all that, I keep taking photos of waterfalls. Here are a few that look pretty cool:

We passed some baby seagulls in their nests:

And some pods of wild dolphins playing in the sound:

Evelyn made the bold decision to kayak out into the sound with one of the crew of the boat:

That's her, disappearing into the distance:

While Evelyn tried to find her way back to the boat, I took this cool photo of a hanging valley. The glaciers carved these valleys out of the mountains, but not all of them are full of seawater. The ones that aren't are called "hanging."

She made it back!

We did a little fishing. Evelyn caught a red wrasse. Later, we ate it. Good on ya, Evelyn!

We passed a few seals in the sound:

Then Evelyn caught an ocean perch! The ugliest fish we'd ever seen! Good on ya, Evelyn! Later, we ate it.

A few more photos - pretty much every direction could have made a beautiful photo.

We pulled up some crayfish. These are spiny rock lobsters, locally called crayfish. Nothing I could do could prevent Evelyn from singing Rock Lobster every time we looked at these guys. Later, we ate them.