Doubtful Sound Part II

When we were planning this vacation, we thought that booking the cottage and the sailboat would be the hardest to schedule and as a result we waited until those two items were settled before booking the rest of the excursions and flights.

The sad outcome of that strategy is that all of the twin share rooms on the Doubtful Sound cruise were booked for the night we had available by the time we got around to making that booking. We decided the trip was attractive enough that sharing a room would be acceptable. We still think that is true as the cruise was fantastic, but the night spent in the quad share room was not one we would repeat any time soon. To be clear, our bunk mates from Australia were very considerate and thoughtful and we can't fault them in any way. It was just the nature of the accomodation that was not desirable.

The quad share rooms are located in the lowest deck of the ship. Here is the view down the stairs. The shared shower room is on the left and the shared washroom cubicles are on the right.


At the bottom of the stairs is this central room with the quad share bunk rooms on either side. The rooms are separated from this room with a curtain.


This is our room. I slept on the top and Debbie slept on the bottom.


The view out the porthole shows how low on the ship we are.


Aside from the sleeping arrangements, the rest of the ship is very nicely appointed and is well suited to ferrying 60 or so passengers around the Sound. This is the dining saloon with Debbie having some after breakfast tea as we headed back to the dock.



The day began at 6:45am when, as warned, the captain started the engines. Sleeping in steerage as we were, the engines were very loud. A full hot breakfast was served from 7:00 to 8:00 after which we were encouraged to do some last minute sight seeing before packing up our gear.




The rains of the day before had sprouted some new small waterfalls.



We had a fellow shutterbug snap the tired two of us at the rail.


As we made our way back I got a few more mist-covered-mountain shots.





After another harrowing bus trip over the mountain we arrived safely back at the Manapouri Power Station docks.


As we travelled over the winding roads the weather cleared finally and the boat ride across Lake Manapouri was much cheerier.



We once again packed ourselves and our gear into the car and headed off toward Queenstown.



The road to Queenstown passes mostly through valleys and farmland with a couple of low mountain passes except for the last section that hugs the edge of a large lake. The main hazard on the trip, though, was the road construction.

We came upon one such hazard that announced itself with a hail of stone being picked up by the tires and thrown against the underside of the vehicle. We came up to a construction sign person who very helpfully walked over to us and let us know that we would be waiting for a few minutes. You don't get that kind of personal service from those sign holders very often.

When the sign turned to "Go" we turned into the oncoming lane and drove onto the freshly "paved" side of the road. In that area apparently the concept of Tar and Gravel road sealing relies heavily on the Tar part and not so much on the Gravel. At 10 kph the sound of gravel being thrown at the underside of the car was almost deafening, kind of like the sound of a heavy downpour on a steel roof. Imagine how thrilled we were to have our rental car being stone blasted from underneath. I could only imagine how many stone chips the side of the car was going to have when we were done.

The cringing continued for what seemed like a very long distance and to add to my anxiety the large string of traffic that had built up behind us as we waited seemed to be in a greater hurry and less concerned about their vehicles than we were. In all it took us 10 minutes to travel less than 3 kilometers. Even after we left the construction area the stones kept breaking free from the wheel wells and bouncing off the tires for many kilometers later. I am happy to report that the mudflap s seem to have saved the sheetmetal from the stony onslaught.

Queenstown is situated on the shore of the long and narrow Lake Wakatipu. The last 45 km or so of the drive into town is along the shoreline of the lake with many narrow not-so-gently winding sections. We stopped at a couple of the observation sites along the way and grabbed a few photos. This one is looking south away from Queenstown.


Strangely there was a second observation spot just a little bit away from the one we first stopped at ...


... so we drove on over there.

This one had a much longer view north along the length of the lake.




In typical New Zealand fashion, the site had no railings keeping the unwary from toppling down the steep edge to the rocks below.


One final pic before heading off ...


We found a motel in town with no trouble, though there were a surprising number of No Vacancy signs on the road into town. After settling in we wandered to the downtown area and inspected the shops before finding a lakeside bar for a much needed refreshment. The lakeside walk is nicely finished for strolling tourists and buskers set themselves up to play for the meandering crowd.



It had been a long day so we found some dinner (a Mexican restaurant with an unusual take on the genre) and then headed back to the motel for an early night.

I hope you enjoyed Doubtful Sound. Next: off to Franz Joseph Glacier.

Until then,

Don