Hi all,

Well this morning, 15th December, I drove from Te Anau to Manapouri to be able to board the "Fiordland Explorer" on an overnight cruise of Doubtful Sound.

First we took a high powered catamaran accross lake Manapouri and then onto a coach for a 22km drive over the mountain, on a road only built in the 60s for the local HEP station which now produces something like 15% of all NZs power.

After the coach, it was 1pm and onto the boat/ship. A brand new vessel and built specificaly for this experience. Takes 70 people, most in 2 bed cabins, and then about 32 of us cheapskates in 4 bed open dorms below the waterline. At $600 (thats about 250 quid) to shae a double room, you can guess I went for the open dorms!

The boat set off at around 2.30pm and cruised up the Sound. The weather was beautiful, bearing in mind in rains 200 days of the year in the sound and the annual rainfall is a staggering 7 metres.

Fantastic viewing of the glacier cut mountains and the vegitation is basically rainforests. Mid afternoon we stopped in a bay for everyone to either go out on the tender of go kayaking. Last time I stepped into a canoe was 20 year ago, but I thought what the hell and so went for it. Was keen to do it as I knew I could get some good piccies of the ship for the kayak providing I didnt fall out!

After this we cruised out the the tasmin sea, and in doing so, managed to see NZ sea lions basking on the outer rocks and also 3 penguins. I cant for the love of me remeber what they are actually called, but they are the rarest int he world with only 3000 around NZ.

On the way back, the annoucement came that there was a school of dolphins dollowing the boat and that they may come close as they like the wake waves it creates. Silly me was in the bar having a "speights" and my camera was down on the bunk being recharged. I ran downstairs to get the camera and as I turned to go back up, I looked ouot the little porthole of the cabin and there was a dolphin really close. I got some great video and really hope I can post this onto the website. I then went top deck and one dolphin was basically jumping in and oput of the water at the back of the boat...again got some ace video..check it out!

Then back into another cove, to moor and have dinner. The food was simply stunning with all different types of starters, mains and a full carvery. needless to say I went up 3 times thinking I could eat enough for the next 3 days....

The evening then was a mixture of good conversation, wine, more talk and many beers. Dodnt sleep too well and some fat Aussie managed to outsnore me! (Jay....did you put him up to this after the world cup???)

Up at 7am for a full english breakfast, again I stuffed myself silly and then out of deck to go around the various coves around the sound. It was raining relatively hard which only reminded us all what a lucky day we had had the day before.

Saw some more penguins in the sea.

Only slight fructration was no whales. (Thats youre fault Tim.....you can tell ssarah she is safe!)

Back to land at 1pm, coach and back in my little car at 3pm.

Then a nice leisurely drive to Queenstown where I am now. Beautiful scenery of the "remarkables" being a mountain range. Got here at 3.30pm. Down to more boring stuff like checking in, unpacking and worst of all doing my laundry..that was easy though as most of my clothes walked to the laundry room on their own they were so smelly!!!

Tonight..who knows...but I think Queenstown is quite lively as meant to be the "activity town of the world" as this is where bungy was invented...... christ not only do you get a blog, but you get facts that may help you in your next pub quiz as well!!!

Take care everyone...

Steve