B & E California Bound: Exploring New Zealand, February 2016, Part 2

As a decade birthday gift for Erick, we signed up for "Exploring Australia and New Zealand," a University of Michigan Alumni tour coordinated by Odysseys International. This post covers our trips to Queenstown and to Milford Sound. (You can click on a photo to see a larger version.).

Day 16: We traveled by bus from Mt. Cook to Queenstown taking a scenic route through Twizel (lots of Lord of the Rings scenery), the Lindis Pass, Maori Point Vineyard near Queensberry, Omarama, Cromwell, the Kawarau Gorge (AJ Hackett Bungy Jump) and Arrowtown.

Back on the bus - Scotty, our driver

Farewell to Mt Cook / Aoraki from the shores of Lake Pukaki

Passing through salmon country:

Salmon farming area

Salmon splashing

Omarama: Café and antique shop with Xena memorabilia

Clay cliffs marking passage from the MacKenzie region to the Central region of New Zealand:

Lindis Pass & Valley:

Maori Point Vineyard: Gandalf, the young Lab, helped greet us. Matt explained how the vineyard is managed. He also manages a vineyard in Sonoma, CA – possible because the seasons are reversed in the southern and northern hemispheres. His wife Maggie assisted with our wine tasting. And Melinda who owns the vineyard with husband John stopped by.

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Approaching the vineyard

Matt & Maggie

Gandalf - still a puppy

Vines with bird netting

In the kitchen / tasting room

Sparkling wine, individual servings - Gold Digger

On to Cromwell:

Cattle, sheep & grape vines

Lake Pukaki

Cromwell: We had lunch in this newer town built to replace a town submerged by the dam project that created Lake Dunstan along the Clutha River.

The dam project

Gibbston Valley area: our post-lunch rest stop featured an orchard, fruit stand and a lovely rose garden.

Kawarau Bridge: We watched the thriving bungy jumping enterprise started by AJ Hackett at this, the home to the world’s first and most famous of leaps located 140+ ft above the Kawarau River.

Bungy jumper - not from our group. Her hair touched the water.

Arrowtown: We took a short side trip to this old mining town where we checked out the local museum and the Jade & Opal Factory. The Maori have carved jade (pounamu - greenstone) and used opal (paua – sea opal, abalone) in decorating for centuries. (Photos from Rotorua and Auckland will show examples.)

Arrowtown was a gold rush town

We arrived around dinner time at the St. Moritz hotel on the banks of Lake Wakapitu (Sleeping Giant), the longest lake in New Zealand.

View of Lake Wakapitu from our hotel

Day 17: What a way to spend Leap Day! We headed by bus to Milford Sound (a fiord, formed by a river) via Te Anau, a small town on the eastern shore of Lake Te Anau in Fiordland. Photo stops included the Englinton Valley, Mirror Lakes, Knobs Flat, and Monkey Creek (named for the tree-top exploration that was necessary to find a route for putting a road through the area).

Englinton Valley

Mirror Lakes wildlife

Near Knobs Flat:

Continuing towards Milford Sound:

The Chasm: Our hike took us across footbridges over the Cleddau River in Fiordland National Park, about halfway between Milford Sound and the Homer Tunnel. Thousands of years of swirling water have sculpted shapes and basins in the rock. The sheer velocity of the water gives an appreciation of how much rainfall the Milford Sound area receives in a year (250+ inches).