Day 331: Milford Sound via Cessna + Boat – Dolphins!!!!
Teddy told me tonight: “I’m glad you’re writing the blog today because I don’t have the vocabulary to describe what we saw.”
I don’t have the vocabulary either but I’ll dive into Thesaurus.com and try.
I’ll start by saying that we’ve divvied up the planning for remaining stops between us — Teddy’s in charge of half and I’m responsible for half. He did Taupo, for instance, while I did Wellington. I’m doing Queenstown, while he’s got Nelson.
So for my Queenstown stretch, I decided a week ago to book a Cessna scenic flight out to Mildford Sound, “nature cruise” on the water, and flight back. This, we learned, is one of New Zealand’s most popular tourist attractions. Milford Sound is a bit of the vast fjordland national park closest to Queenstown, and therefore popular. It’s a five-hour drive from Queenstown or a 35-minute flight.
Regular readers will know by now that I developed a healthy fear of flying while we were in Asia and small planes are now terrifying to me.
But I felt like THIS is what you come to see when you come to Queenstown — this dramatic landscape — so we had to do it.
It turned out to be a top-five outing of the year, I think. Not only because it was jaw-dropping/breath-taking/mind-blowing and whatever other hyphenated descriptor you can come up with (I’m out), but also because 1) the bad weather let up for a five-hour window and 2) the wildlife cooperated.
The weather has been so gnarly lately that the Air Milford folks said it was the worst they’d seen in five years — and they were only going out once every seven days, on average. You got the impression it was hurting business.
But when we showed up the sky was blue and the sun was shining.
Captain Hank — a 70-something Kiwi pilot who struck us as New Zealand’s version of Sully Sullenberger — welcomed us, briefed us, and then packed us into his Cessna for the ride.
He assured us that we were in the “newest plane with the oldest pilot.” Words I needed to hear. We rode with four very nice 30-something Brazilians in town for a wedding.
This ride – wow.
Hank stayed low-ish, and it felt like we were grazing the pointed tops of green hills, then, later, snow-capped mountains. I tried not to think about “Alive.”
I forgot how those planes feel less like tin cans and more like those 100-calorie mini aluminum Coke cans. So tiny and meaningless out there in the big windy sky.
plane’s little wheel over big blue water 
We descended into the fjord like something out of Star Wars.
We caught one of those big nice catamarans we’ve now been on three times — first to snorkel in the Great Barrier Reef, then to tour the Gordon River in Tasmania (that outing if you recall was kind of a bust — pouring rain, freezing, very very long).
This tour was, as boat tours go, perfect. One hour and forty-five minutes. Warm enough to stand out on the bow the whole time but not feel hot. The kids felt comfortable enough to go inside on their own and come out when they heard something exciting happening (seals! A waterfall!).
No question, the highlight of the whole day (week? Month? year??), was seeing a pod of dolphins frolicking in the water. The pod swam over to us and “surfed” in our wake. The captain said that the sign of an intelligent animal is that they have a sense of humor or playfulness. These dolphins were having *the time of their lives.* They were leaping and jumping, then all got up in front of our huge, speeding boat, and raced along ahead of it, looking back up at us, leaping, etc.
We had a front row seat for it all — we were standing outside on the bow, looking directly over them. It was one of the most remarkable experiences of my life.
Eventually they swam off and we continued on.
Imagine gliding through placid blue waters with soaring cliffs on either side, many with waterfalls and teetering pines hanging off. The sun was out and the seagulls were there to give us scale — they were tiny white pin pricks in a massive expanse of water and cliffs.
The captain steered us toward a 15-story-high waterfall for a “glacial facial” — hahah, I know. He said something to the effect of: “All of you on the bow are going to get soaked BUT BUT BUT before you go in….maybe just experience it….you’ll remember this in ten years…you only live once….” Or something cheesy. But it got me to stay! I moved to the front of the boat and didn’t move even as the spray became an unbearable firehose and we were all shrieking.
Dad, Teddy and I got drenched. Facial indeed. But worth it…
Eventually the ride was over and Sully/Hank flew us back to Queenstown on a different route. It was turbulent because the nasty front was coming back, and we had a sliver of time to get through before they would ground us.
“It’s going to be ‘rock and roll’ for the ride home,” Hank told us over the speaker. Ugh. But we survived.
Best thing we’ve done in New Zealand, for sure. Better than Sheep World!! Ha!
Back in Queenstown, we grabbed lunch at Devil Burger before hitting a stick beach and a playground, where Willa braved the freezing water to play on this Tarzan swing.
Dad went to rest at his hotel, then came to our place around 5:30 for a cocktail and eventually, a very light dinner. The kids are beyond excited that he’s here, and as a result, have been kind of annoying in a spazzy way. I wish I could just be thrilled that they’re excited to see their grandfather but….their giddiness is the opposite of relaxing. Anyway.
Tried to get them to calm down by having Beepaw do a drawing project with them. Here he is drawing Hogwarts.
After dinner the kids did a (hilarious) dance performance for us, then dad took Teddy outside to show him how to cast a fly fishing rod in anticipation of tomorrow’s fishing outing.
Meanwhile I put a dent in The Hobbit.
That fishing outing is looking questionable at this point, btw — it’s raining cats and dogs outside. We’ll see.
