05.26.2004 - Queenstown, New Zealand

WOW! I spent yesterday and today in Fiordland National Park, which encompasses a vast area in the southwestern corner of New Zealand’s South Island. Yesterday I was on an all-day trip to Doubtful Sound. It was an amazing trip, beginning with a boat trip across Lake Manapouri. Early morning clouds were beginning to lift, showing patches of brilliant blue peeking through. Low hanging clouds hung in front of mountains and over the water. Then it was a bus ride through the wilderness (which becomes a rainforest on the fiord side of the mountains) down to the head of Doubtful Sound. By this time the day was perfect (although very cold). It rains an average of two out of every three days on the fiord side of the mountains. They get an incredible 25 FEET of rain a year there. It rains so much that usually there is a meter or two of fresh water on top of the salt water of the fiords. The fiord is breathtakingly beautiful. Walls of rock—mostly gray granite similar to Yosemite—rise straight up from the water to great heights. The only downside to the beautiful weather was the lack of waterfalls. The cliffs above the fiord are so vertical, with the vegetation barely clinging to the hard rock and no soil beneath, that there is nothing to hold the water. Our guide said that during and for a few hours after a rain, there are as many as a thousand waterfalls falling into the fiord. That’s something to come back to see!

I learned on the trip that the flowers of native plants in New Zealand do not have bright colors. They are almost all white. The reason for this is that there were no bees or butterflies in New Zealand, so there was no need for plants to develop brightly colored flowers to attract them for pollination. Moths were the only means of pollination, so white flowers that could be seen at night were the best adaptation to the circumstances.

So much for the flora. As for the fauna, I lucked out again, as with the penguins on the Otago Peninsula. Shortly after our boat got out onto Doubtful Sound, we spotted dolphins. About ten of them came over to the boat and stayed with us for twenty minutes or so, jumping, diving, sending up spouts, and so forth. It was great.

To top the day off, there was a beautiful sunset over Lake Manapouri when we returned. By the trip back I had decided that Fiordland must rank at least number 5 on my list of favorite places I’ve been in the world.

Today I went to Milford Sound, by far the best known and most visited place in the park. The road from Te Anau to Milford Sound is amazing. I would rate it as the second most beautiful road I’ve ever been on. Among roads I’ve driven, only the Going to the Sun Highway in Glacier National Park tops it. The early part of the drive after you enter Fiordland National Park is very reminiscent of Wyoming. The drive is along a flat valley floor with a stream in the middle and brown grasslands with what almost look like tumbleweeds. Very pointed mountains with snow on the top line one side of the valley, very much like the Grand Tetons. During this part of the trip, I passed a sign saying 45 degrees south latitude. That’s halfway between the Equator and the South Pole, so I know I was in the southern quarter of the planet. (I remember as a child on our trip into the Maritime Provinces of Canada passing a point in New Brunswick that said it was halfway between the Equator and the North Pole.)

Then it is up into the mountains, with stunning overlooks (and plants crusted in frost and ice. It was remarkable to see big ferns encrusted in ice. (The roads were, as the signs say here, “frosty,” but crews had put down sand and grit, so driving was OK.) Then it was into the Homer Tunnel. This tunnel (and I presume the road beyond it) was constructed as a make-work project during the Depression. (It’s strange how the Depression seems to keep popping up on my trip. The Great Ocean Road in Australia was also a make-work project from that era. At least some good came from the Depression.) It’s a pretty primitive tunnel, with rough rock all around you as you drive through a more-or-less circular hole through the mountain. Then it’s a steep, curving descent down to sea level and the head of Milford Sound. This fiord is dominated by Mitre Peak, which rises from the water near the fiord’s end. Milford is considerably shorter and narrower than Doubtful. This means that at this time of the year (the shortest day of the year in the Southern Hemisphere is only about a month away), even on a perfect day, the sun never gets down into large parts of the fiord.

In addition to Mitre Peak, Milford Sound features two permanent waterfalls, Bowen and Stirling. Both are impressive, especially since they fall into the water of the fiord. Neither, however, is nearly as spectacular as several of the waterfalls in Yosemite. As in Doubtful Sound, here too there are many more waterfalls when it rains, but most of them dry up quickly.

After seeing both fiords and driving the road to Milford, I think I have to move Fiordland National Park to number 1 as my favorite place in the world, although the top five—Fiordland; the Berner Oberland in Switzerland; Moraine Lake in Alberta; Glacier National Park, and Yosemite—are all almost equal in my mind.

Each of the two fiords that can be reached by visitors is different, and I’m very glad that I saw both. It’s hard to say which I liked better, but I think I’d have to say Doubtful, even though I saw it without its waterfalls. It’s remarkable with all the rain they get here that I had two perfect sunny days in a row. I am most thankful. The guide on the trip to Doubtful Sound said that it only rains there twice a week—once for three days and once for four!

The reason for all the rain, I found out, is that the southwest corner of New Zealand’s South Island is in the “Roaring Forties”—the forty degrees south latitude in which there is almost no land to slow down the wind, rains, and storms that rush around that portion of the globe from west to east. When these storms do hit land, they dump huge amounts of rain. (The west coast of Tasmania also has high rainfall for the same reason.)

Driving to Milford is like going from Grand Teton on one side to Yosemite on the other; but Yosemite has been moved to the coast and filled with water. That’s quite a combination! But there’s more. Mitre Peak is almost as iconic as the Matterhorn. The park also has glaciers, although not nearly as many as Glacier, Switzerland, or Moraine Lake. This park also has the rainforests with giant ferns and tree ferns. None of my other favorite places have these along with the other features. This place is wonderful.

On my long drive to Queenstown in the late afternoon and evening, I was struck more and more by how much the area looks like Wyoming. I had some trouble finding my hotel after dark, but finally did so without having to ask for directions.

The sky tonight is amazingly clear. The Milky Way is readily visible, as is the Southern Cross. Someone who works at the hotel pointed it out to me so that I’m sure I have the right stars that make up this famous constellation. (The left arm of the cross is very faint in comparison with the rest of it.)

I love this country!

On a less happy note, I read in the paper here a story about how, during his speech on Iraq, George W. Bush had pronounced Abu Ghraib three different ways, all of them wrong, despite much coaching by his handlers ahead of time so that he’d get it right. The man is a laughing stock (at best) around the world.

RSM