Day 20: 20/1/13
I got up early this morning as I didn't have my bag packed or anything. I got myself ready quicker than expected so I had about 10 minutes to Skype home and see how they were!
Jenny and I were going on this trip together to Milford Sound and Stewart island. It's only a small bus this time- just 24 people. There's a young German guy who was on the bus with us for a few days and an older English guy that has been on the bus since the start both doing this section aswell. There's a group of older Asian people that joined us a few days ago with lots of cameras that are here too!
We stopped a few times during the morning or toilet breaks, supermarket stops and to book the Milford Sound cruise. We had a good long drive in around mountains and things. It was pretty enough but today was very cloudy so I'd say it would be gorgeous on a sunny day.
Milford Sound was rated by Trip Advisor as the best destination in the world in 2008. Its like a channel of water leading out to the sea, in between mountains with waterfalls running down them. I had seen photos from one of the other guys that went on a day trip the other day and it was stunning. The sun was shining and the mountains were reflected in the water. However, for us, it was really cloudy! It rained a lot of the day, but didn't actually rain while we were on the boat. It was cold and windy though. The views were impressive even though it wasn't anything compared to the photos the other guys had! We did get more waterfalls than them though. So, you can't win!! The boat went right up close to some waterfalls so we all got a bit wet! At one stage Jenny and I went inside from the viewing deck and just as she opened the door, one of the Tawaianese men near the door let out a big fart! That kept us laughing! We pulled up close to some seals too which were really cute. The clouds over the waterfalls and mountains did look interesting and a bit of sun came out near the end making nice shadows on the mountains!
After that we drove to our accommodation. We had to go through some mountains and there was a tunnel blasted through them that men had to do with very little machinery back in the 1930's-60's. We pulled up near that as there were some kea birds which are big parrots. They are big ugly brown yokes, but underneath their wings when they fly there's loads of pretty red feathers.
We got to our accommodation close to 7. It was called Gunns camp and was a place where the workers stayed when they were building the roads and tunnels. We had little cabins with fairly new looking bunk beds in them. The kitchen was new too but the whole set up was old. They had a generator powering the place and the electricity cut off at 10pm. The toilets were fairly dark too and there was a big boiler for the hot water. It was a very interesting place but we were all tucked into bed early to make sure we were ready before the lights vanished, and they did cut out!!