We arrived in Te Anau and found our accommodation for the next couple of days; a rather lovely holiday home with all mod cons. After a quick unpack of the van we headed down to the lake. It was still beautiful even on that cloudy day,
surrounded by mountains and not a lot else. We caught a boat out to see the glow worm caves on the other side of the lake. This is where words will probably let me down. We weren't allowed to take photos or film so I'll try and paint a picture with help from Joe and Ben's interpretations.......This is the promo vid for the tour. Of course it stops just short of the main attraction!
First we watched a video about the glow worms and all their yucky habits, then we were led in small groups into the cave system, walking over fast flowing water most of the way. The noise of the waterfall within that part of the cave is deafening but we could already see a few glow worms on the ceiling. As we headed up the system we approached a platform where we boarded a small boat. Then the guide switched out the lights and we gently floated along a tunnel. IT WAS AMAZING!!!! The glow worms were thousands of green/blue lights on the ceiling. Joe said it looked like the stars and Ben said they were like Christmas lights. Of course it was over all too soon and we had to retrace our steps back to the low cave entrance.
The following day we drove the well worn road to Milford Sound to catch yet another boat! We started early and many of the mountains were still shrouded in cloud, but luckily the day cleared and became quite warm. There are so many little (and long) walks along the way, many through the beech rainforest, with huge tree ferns.
There were so many photo opportunities that we were cutting it pretty fine for our trip!We stopped a few times including at Mirror lakes,
The Chasm (falls), Lake Gunn
and plenty of viewpoints.
The fjord was quite calm at the harbour and the sun was burning off much of the cloud, closer to the sea it was much rougher and misty!
We stopped at 'The Deep' on the return journey. A floating platform at one edge of the fjord that has an underwater viewing platform. There we saw corals and other sea life that is normally found in much deeper waters.
We drove back to Te Anau after a really long day, but did stop to cool off in one of the many rivers.
We would love to go back and see it all when there is more snow around, although the drive may be interesting - musn't forget to pack those snow chains!
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