Milford, Doubtful and Dusky Sound

February 1, 2013 - What you see below is what we woke up to this morning.  It was 6:45 am and the pictures do no justice.  Our breath was taken away.  The first 2 pictures are Milford Sound.  This is one of the most beautiful places on earth - picture post card worthy.  The mountain scenery is spectacular and the waterfalls are counted by the hundreds.  Some have claimed this as the 8th wonder of the world.  The sea is over 1000 feet deep and the mountains 1 mile high - the largest water cliff in the world.  The sun broke over the snow capped mountains and put us in awe of our creator.  Our captain turned us around on a dime as they say and we headed back out to sea.  We then discovered that many times the ship does not get to come in due to weather conditions.  One woman tolf us she has cruised here 11 times and only been in once before.  We were indeed fortunate to see these spectacular views.  One can only access this by a pontoon airplane or boat/ship- no roads.  These are located on the very lower west coast of New Zealand.

We then cruised for 2 1/2 hours and came into Doubtful Sound (below).  This was also picture perfect, but very different.  Instead of the straight mountains right into the sea and mostly rock, these were shrub covered and more slopping.  The area is so quiet you can hear the waterfalls as they cascade down the steep rocky vegetated slopes.

As we were leaving we came to a complete stop and wondered why.  Then all of a sudden, out on the horizon came another cruise ship from the opposite direction,.  We were waiting our turn to go through the narrow passage.  It was a smaller ship - The Diamond Princess.  It gave us an idea of the scale of our ship and the mile high mountains on our side.

Of course now it is lunch time and we smelled a barbie.  We went pool side and enjoyed beef sausages, onions and salads.  We had our share and headed up to Johnny Rockets on deck 12.

Here we got some rock and roll music.

AND chocolate malts and a few onion rings.

With all the heavy morning work, we found a chaise on the pool deck and wasted away the next couple of hours.  By this time we were headed into Dusky Sound.  We did ask an Australian why they were called sounds instead of fjords.  He said that is what Captain Cook named them - don't know if that is true or not.  This area was also post card perfect and so quiet.  We think each sound is about 8 miles long.

Dusky Sound

Then off to dinner and a show.  We had surf and turf and 2 desserts - Boston Cream Pie and Hazelnut Souffle.  Early to bed - that means before midnight - we have an early tour tomorrow.