A Doubtful Sound
Yesterday we made up for the failure to get to Mllford Sound by instead going to Doubtful Sound, which in not in fact a sound but is instead a fiord, and no that is not misspelled. The fact that New Zealanders spell fjord ‘fiord’ causes much angst to our Norwegian tour guide, Gareth Davis, who has a Scottish name because his dad heard the name on TV and thought it sounded good. The place was originally named Doubtful Harbor because Captain Cook didn’t enter it, thinking that it might not be navigable. Whalers later renamed the Harbor that is not a harbor into a Sound that is not a sound, so I assume they were afraid to rename it Doubtful Fiord because surely someone would later figure out that it’s not a fiord. Or maybe they were embarrassed to see Fiord on a map when everyone knows it should be Fjord.
The trip to Doubtful requires a bus to get to Lake Manapouri, a ferry across the lake, and another bus through the rainforest to cross over Wilmot Pass. All told, a journey of about 5 hours, which we would reverse to get back to our hotel. It was worth it.
The first bus ride took us the length of Lake Whakatipu and then through ranch lands of many ewes and their cute, frolicking new lambs. Lake Manapouri was nestled deep in among high snow-covered peaks. The ride over Wilmot Pass was through a snowy rainforest.
Snowy rainforest
From the bus -- snow on ferns (and in the air).
The sound itself was awash in gigantic waterfalls. These dry up quickly when it isn’t raining, but that wasn’t a problem.
The three-hour tour of the sound went quickly. Then we reversed our course and went back to our Queenstown hotel.