Friday 10th to Sunday 12th April 2026
We booked a cruise in Milford Sound for the Sunday, so started to make our way north, along Milford Road. The Sound is at the end of a long road which is a dead-end, so we knew we would be returning along the same route, afterwards.
Te Anau:
Te Anau is a lovely small town on the banks of Lake Te Anau.
We found it to be a quiet, resort-style town from where you can take various excursions, including helicopter rides, seaplane rides and boat rides to view the glow-worm caves on the far side of the lake.
They also have one of the published, best pie producers in the country, so we indulged ourselves. Excellent pies! No pictures, they disappeared too fast.
We stayed overnight on one of the Department of Conservation campsites, further down Milford Road, Totara Campsite.
You have to book online and there are minimal facilities, but they are good value at $15 per person (about £7.00). We avoided the site a little further on, named “Knobs Flat” as the name did not seem promising! Hmmm!
Milford Sound:
Our Saturday sailing from Milford Sound Visitor Terminal was at 3.55pm, so we took our time driving there, stopping whenever there was something of interest.
The road climbs steadily for many kilometres, reaching its summit at the mouth of a tunnel, through which the road slopes steeply downwards, then beyond with hairpin bends leading eventually to the parking area for Milford Sound.
Milford Sound sailings are clearly big business, with many vessels moored up. We had chosen one of the smaller providers, with just about the smallest boat. This was great, but it did get a bit choppy at times.
Most sailings last around 2 hours or so, taking passengers out to the Tasman Sea and back, but with check-in and embarkation etc, you can count on 3 hours. Daytime parking costs $10 an hour, but fortunately this drops to $5 after 3pm.
We loved Doubtful Sound, but Milford Sound, if anything, is more dramatic. The mountains on either side of the fjord drop almost vertically into the water and boats can get to within touching distance of the rock walls.
The waterfalls were not perhaps as prolific as in Doubtful, but this was probably due to the excellent weather on the day. Here, though, they mostly drop straight into the water from a great height. This means that with one cascade in particular, boats can get right underneath and soak all the passengers.
We were told about tree avalanches in which trees, that barely have a hold on the rock, eventually give way and take all below, into the water with them.
We thoroughly enjoyed this day out and made our way to our site for the night at Cascade Creek, another DoC site, where we parked-up in darkness, to a wonderful, clear, night sky. Sunday was just a travelling day which saw us retrace our steps south to Te Anau then across towards Kingston, south of Queenstown, for the night.
That is it for today. TTFN and see-u-later.
"See-u-Later" 