So Doubtful it's a Sound...

January 20th

Distance: 0km

Doubtful Sound Tour

Today was our final rest day in Te Anau, and we spent it in style! Going on a tour that both of us had wanted to do for a while, although it was higher on Vaughan's bucket list :)

Doubtful Sound, seen from above:

This tour took the form of a 30-minute bus trip from Te Anau to Manapouri, then an hour-long ferry ride across Lake Manapouri, then another 40-minute bus/coach ride to the eastern end of Doubtful Sound. 

Doubtful Sound was so-named by Captain James Cook when he was charting New Zealand, although he called it Doubtful Bay. He did not actually enter past the mouth, fearing that winds would have kept his ship trapped (note: they only blow "out" about once a month, so he was right), and it was over a century later before another European explorer actually (accidentally) entered the fjord and discovered how far up it went.

Quick vocab/geography lesson:

A "sound" is a drowned river valley.

A "fjord" is a drowned glacial valley.

So while it's called Doubtful Sound (and many of the fjords in this part of New Zealand are called Sounds), it's actually a fjord. 

You can tell a fjord (or a glacial valley) from a sound (or a river valley) by the U-shape (river valleys have more of a V-shape; the upper sides are not so steep).

Proof we're still on this trip together:

We did make it to the mouth of the sound, and felt the turbulent, longer rolling swells of the Tasman Sea. This was Eliza's chance to get sea-sick, but she managed to fight it off, mostly by staring at the horizon and white-knuckling the rail. If you look closely, you can see the crashing waves of the Tasman going over the relatively shallow (30-m deep) gravel bar at the mouth. 

At its deepest, Doubtful Sound is over 420m deep!

And while there has been very little rain for the past week, we did still get to see some waterfalls, going down the very sheer cliffs:

Late in the day they turned off all the engines and gave us a few minutes of absolute silence on the fjord. Here is 60 seconds of that:

https://youtu.be/aF3bR8tmvqc

We also found this plaque which might be of interest to the Polish side of Eliza's family. A tribute to the Polish scientists aboard Captain James Cook's second voyage to NZ.

Also,  here are videos I took while walking through the Takitimu range,  both beech forest and tussock land

https://youtu.be/ZY_69fb7Ots (tussock)

https://youtu.be/uAxnfX8z8iU (forest)

https://youtu.be/NZsZf6Czico (forest, following Vaughan)

Up next: Making our way to Queenstown over the next 5-6 days, via the Mavora Lakes area and part of the Greenstone-Caples Track. This section promises mountains, lakes, and more of our beloved beech forest and tussock country. Hopefully less mud.

Not sure what reception will be like, so don't be surprised if you get a week's worth of updates when we hit Queenstown.