There's nothing like standing on the prow of a ship, leaning into the wind with your arms outstretched shouting 'King of the World'. Had Leo DiCaprio's Jack Dawson been on the Patea Explorer heading out along the Doubtful Sound (so named because James Cook believed it was Doubtful his ship could get up it) he'd have only managed 'King...' before being blasted back against the bridge windows.
A coach collected us from the hotel (I guess we're no longer FIT's) and dropped us at the wharf at Manapouri where we roared across the misty morning of Manapouri lake (separated from Lake Te Anau by a river and controlled by the power station) and hopped on a coach that wound up and over Wilmot Pass (the only way to get to Doubtful) which took 45 mins, including snap-shot stops across the valley where the decidious beech trees cling to the mountains through the moss, lichen and liver-wort (all the soil was stripped away by ice and snow).
Too much wind, rain or snow and the trees can fall, pulling great chunks of interwoven fauna down to their doom...leaving scars on the cliffs.
A coach collected us from the hotel (I guess we're no longer FIT's) and dropped us at the wharf at Manapouri where we roared across the misty morning of Manapouri lake (separated from Lake Te Anau by a river and controlled by the power station) and hopped on a coach that wound up and over Wilmot Pass (the only way to get to Doubtful) which took 45 mins, including snap-shot stops across the valley where the decidious beech trees cling to the mountains through the moss, lichen and liver-wort (all the soil was stripped away by ice and snow).
Too much wind, rain or snow and the trees can fall, pulling great chunks of interwoven fauna down to their doom...leaving scars on the cliffs.
On the other side we tore out into the gale force winds of Doubtful Sound - so strong that everytime I tried to sit down after taking a photo I overshot Laura by 2 feet. The breeze (not entirely chilly) stormed in from the Tasman Sea without end. After an hour Laura needed a break to return the feeling to her face.
Our catamaran cruised by the 40km of Doubtful with temperate climate rainforest on all sides, rising high about us. Doubtful is the second biggest Fiord, but unlike the others it has a fur seal colony at the sea end where we watched the babies with their mothers, getting thrown about by the wash.
Then it was back into Doubtful and up the Crooked Arm where we stopped the engines and all stood in silence to enjoy the silence of the Fiord, without our noise.
After we briefly saw some Bottlenose Dolphins it was back onto the bus and down the 2km's beneath Mt George, where we took a peak at Manapouri Power Station, before the bus then refused to restart. So, after jumpstarting ourselves by going in reverse down the dark tunnel we were free! And then, on the boat back across Lake Manapouri we met a family of Dairy Farmers, one of whom still lives in Lambourn!
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