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| Milford Sound |
Milford Sound is possibly the South Island's most iconic sights. We were hoping for a period of good weather
so that we could spend a while between Te Anau and Milford Sound but
unfortunately we only got a short window of opportunity, so left the bus parked
and took to the car for a very long day trip.
Driving
from Te Anau it is easy to see why the road to Milford Sound has been called
one of New Zealand's most scenic drives.
First there were the views across Lake Te Anau to the Murchison
Mountains beyond. Then at Te Anau Downs,
where hardy walkers depart for the Milford Track, SH 94 entered a
glacier-carved valley between the Earl and Livingstone Ranges. From here every bend in the road revealed dramatic
and picturesque views.
About
62 kilometres north of Te Anau, and easily accessed from the road, are the
Mirror Lakes, where we stopped to stretch our legs and to admire the Earl
Mountains and beech forest reflected in the small pools. Further north, Lake Gunn and Lake Fergus lay
beside the road. Both have DOC
campgrounds with toilets and picnic tables and are popular trout-fishing
spots. There were bush walks here too
and we wished we had more time to explore them.
As
the road wound towards its highest point there were several lookouts. Pop's Lookout had interpretation boards
explaining how the road was built, and with stories relating to the pioneering
road-builders and their families. There
was a small car park nearby, where we had our picnic lunch, admiring views to
the snowy peak of Mount Crosscut behind the huge glacial valley.
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| On the way to Milford Sound |
We
took a side trip down the Lower Hollyford Road, which branches off at Marian
Corner. After eight kilometres we came
to Gunn's Camp. The camp (using the
Public Works Department huts that once housed the road builders) was run for 80
years by two generations of the Gunn family and is now managed by a trust. What I thought was memorabilia was actually a
working petrol pump, much to the relief of a car load of young tourists who had
obviously been unaware of the fact that there are no petrol stations after Te
Anau. The Hollyford Road was bush-lined,
unsealed and on the wild side. The
Hollyford River ran beside the road and, every so often, there were small
pedestrian swing bridges leading to short bushwalks. We checked one or two out before reaching the
road end. Here we walked for 30 minutes
through lush rainforest to the Humboldt Falls, which cascaded down for 275
metres, in three drops.
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| Gunn's Camp |
Further
along the main road we came to the Homer Tunnel, set in a natural ice-carved
amphitheatre. The area had alpine
buttercups and daisies growing amongst the shrubs and tussocks. There was a nature walk here but the most
popular draw-card were the kea, which gathered around hoping for food
scraps. DOC discourages the feeding of
kea, as free 'junk food' prevents the birds from learning how to forage for
their natural foods. Not all tourists
(or birds) realised this, and there was a gang of these intelligent and
inquisitive kea enthralling passing motorists.
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| kea |
Surveying
began here as early as 1890 but it was only during the depression era that work
on the Homer Tunnel began. The narrow
tunnel was opened in 1954 and traffic lights operate, as vehicles can still
only travel in one direction at a time.
Once through the tunnel, the road zigzagged down to sea level. About half way between the Homer Tunnel and
Milford Sound we came to the Chasm Walk, where we took another break and
wandered along the 15-minute loop. This
took us over bridges above the Cleddau River— which had gouged and carved rock
into sculptures, as it poured over a series of waterfalls.
Finally
Milford Sound, also known as Piopiotahi, appeared at the end of the road. Rudyard Kipling called it the eighth wonder
of the world, and Mitre Peak was certainly an arresting sight. There was a foreshore walk, where we gazed up
at the lofty mountain—it towered 1,692 metres above the water. There were also great views of Bowen Falls
and the boats that take passengers for a closer look. These boats were dwarfed by the grandeur of
Milford Sound.
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| Milford Sound |
The
next leg of our Deep South trip took us from Te Anau to Riverton, a town known
as 'Southland's Riviera'. While the area
couldn't truthfully be called subtropical, visiting on a sunny summer's day we
got the idea. Arriving on the 'Southern
Scenic Route', SH 99, we crossed the narrow one-way bridge, with views of
Jacobs River estuary to the right and picturesque fishing boats clinging to
wooden jetties around the bay to the left.
Riverton was known as Jacob's River when it was first settled in 1836,
and is the oldest permanent European settlement in Southland.
Nowadays Riverton is also known as Aparima,
the name Māori used for their pā and river.
The first settler in the area was Captain John Howell, who established a
whaling station and married a high-ranking Māori woman. Soon Riverton harbour was crowded with
whaling, sealing and immigrant ships, and had become a bustling port. An early government official described it as
'one of the loveliest spots in New Zealand' and, as we strolled around, we had
to agree.
There
were still many wonderful old buildings dating back to Riverton's Victorian
heyday, now mostly housing cafes and art galleries. Along the waterfront, opposite Riverton's
Anglican Church, there was a pleasant area to explore, which included a large
viewing platform, sculpture and native planting, leading to the town's museum:
Te Hikoi Southern Journey.
We
freedom camped near Monkey Island. This
popular spot is just off the main road south of Orepuki. It has a beautiful, sandy bay, with a rocky
area at the headland including the small mound that is Monkey Island. In the 1860s, before the road was built from
Riverton, there was a slipway here, so boats could unload supplies for the
little settlement on the shore. A
'monkey winch' was used to haul boats ashore, and this gave its name to the
island. Māori know the island as Te Puka
o Takitimu, the anchor-stone of the Takitimu
waka, which legends say was wrecked in Te Waewae Bay. Monkey Island can be reached at low tide and
we walked out one evening to be rewarded by a gorgeous view along the sweep of
Te Waewae Bay and a magnificent sunset.
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| Cosy Nook |
We
used our car to explore the unsealed roads between SH 99 and the Foveaux
Strait. Tucked in behind Pahia Point are
Cosy Nook and Garden Bay, picturesque coves with quirky little fishermen's
cribs and boat-houses. Cosy Nook was
named by the first settler, Captain George Thompson, after his home village of
Cozy Nuek in the Scottish Borders, and the craggy bays are reminiscent of
Scotland. Further east was the famous
surf beach, Colac Bay. We could not miss
it, there was a giant sculpture of a surfie beside the pub and campground.
From
Riverton we headed to Invercargill where we parked Tangaroa at a POP.
Invercargill has a character all of its own. It has an impressive main street lined with
Victorian buildings. J. T. Thomson, the
surveyor who planned many of Otago's towns, set out Invercargill too—a mile
square and containing four reserves within the boundaries. Invercargill is the commercial centre of
Southland and is the southernmost and most westerly city in New Zealand.
Being
so far south, Invercargill gets plenty of rainy and cold, blustery days. Farmers store had flannelette pyjamas in its
window display when we were there in January!
Luckily there are things to see and do out of the weather. Perhaps the most unusual is the most famous
Hammer Hardware in New Zealand—the only one that is a tourist attraction. This is E. Hayes and Sons, an offshoot of the
Hayes Engineering family from Central Otago.
This old-fashioned hardware shop also has a collection of vintage
vehicles, the jewel in the crown being the Indian Scout motorcycle that once
belonged to Burt Munro of The World's
Fastest Indian fame. Burt was an
Invercargill man and friendly with Hayes, who bought the Indian and some other
bikes before Munro's death. As we walked
around the shop we were able to view the motorcycles, set up between the
lawnmowers and bags of nails.
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| At E Hayes and Son, Invercargill |
There
is actually a motorcycle museum in Invercargill too, the Classic Motorcycle
Mecca with three hundred rare bikes. However
we were meeting up with friends, and they had been there, so we went to
Transport World instead. Bill
Richardson's collection is the largest private collection of its type in the
world and we spent several hours looking at everything from Henry Ford's letter
cars to retro kombis, racing cars and trucks.
There is really too much to see here in one go (there is a wearable art
collection for those not so interested in the vehicles) but it was a good way
to pass a freezing afternoon.
Another
day we spent some time in the Southland Museum and Art Gallery. There is plenty to see here too. I was especially interested in an exhibition
entitled 'Beyond the Roaring 40s'. This
told the story of New Zealand's sub-Antarctic islands and included the
harrowing tales of people shipwrecked there.
Eleven ships were known to have been wrecked in the 1800s, nine of which
had survivors who lived as castaways for months or years. Nineteen of these survived for eighteen
months on the Auckland Islands, 465 kilometres south of New Zealand, after the
sinking of the General Grant in 1866
with the loss of 68 lives. The survivors
made needles from albatross bones and clothes and shoes from sealskin. The General
Grant had been heading from Melbourne to London with several miners (who
had 'struck it rich') and their gold, as well as families with children, other passengers
and crew. After news of the General Grant castaways became known,
the government established regularly maintained provision depots.
It
was hard to imagine being marooned for so long in such an inhospitable and
desolate spot. It was cold enough
sometimes in Invercargill during summer!
However we had long wanted to visit Stewart Island, so we checked out
the long range weather forecast and found a nice sunny day coming up. We decided on a day trip, booking tickets for
the ferry and also arranging for a water taxi to Ulva Island, in Stewart
Island's Paterson Inlet. This is a bird
sanctuary and several people had told us we should not miss visiting.
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| Bluff |
We
arrived at blustery Bluff at 7.30 am on the appointed morning and booked in for
our trip. The ferry left promptly at
8.00 am and almost immediately began swooping, surfing and crashing into the
waves. Spray flew higher than the
windows. The skipper told us the Foveaux
Strait is notoriously rough as it is the meeting point of the Pacific and
Southern Oceans and the Tasman Sea. The
crossing took around an hour and Stewart Island, with its scatter of smaller
islets gradually came into view.
Arriving
at Halfmoon Bay we got our first sight of Oban, Stewart Island's township. Having three hours before our water taxi was
due to leave for Ulva Island, we decided to explore Oban. Before we headed into the settlement though,
we took a short walk in the opposite direction to the protected, sandy Bathing
Beach—where ours were the only footprints on the pristine sand. I'm sure it is lovely to swim there on a
sunny afternoon but we weren't tempted at just after nine in the morning!
The track looped back into
Oban. I had read that there were very
few places to get food and drink on Stewart Island so we were happy to see a
small cafe, the Kiwi French Cafe, where we got coffee and cake before wandering
around the few streets of the township.
Beside the cafe, two sweet Shetland ponies looked pleadingly at
visitors, who stopped to give them carrots from bowls provided on a nearby table. Two collies snoozed in the sunshine.
The
Ulva Island boats leave from Golden Bay Wharf, which was a fifteen minute walk
by road, but we opted to walk the Deep Bay to Golden Bay track. This left town by way of the steep Petersons
Hill Road and passed through Deep Bay Reserve, before reaching Deep Bay in the Paterson
Inlet. The track then undulated, with
steps taking walkers up and down, through coastal forest—with peeps out into
the Inlet. To our surprise there was a
huge cruise ship anchored in Paterson Inlet, dwarfing the other boats.
The
walk brought us to Golden Bay, where we received our boarding passes for Ulva
Island: leaves from the puheretaiko plant, known as muttonbird scrub. The papery underside of these leaves was used
for postcards on Stewart Island, and was legal post up until the 1970s. The Stewart Island Post Office used to be on
Ulva Island, which was central for the islands of the Paterson Inlet. When a mail boat arrived, the Trail family,
who built the Post Office in 1872, raised a flag on Flagstaff Point to let the
locals know there was mail. The Post
Office was used until 1923.
Our
water taxi was waiting when we arrived at the wharf. Although we had booked for the regular 12.00 pm
run there were five others waiting, so our boatman took us straight across,
half an hour early. We were pleased
about this because we had realised that the complete circuit of walking track
at the Ulva Island Reserve would take more time than the person at the
Invercargill i-SITE had suggested when we booked. The boatman was happy to pick us up at 3.00 pm
(instead of the 2.00 pm that we'd booked) and this gave us enough time to
complete the track.
Ulva
Island was reserved in 1899 for the preservation of 'native game and flora' and
was one of New Zealand's first reserves.
It is now managed by DOC, enhanced by the Ulva Island Charitable Trust,
and is pest free. There were never any
rabbits, mice or mustelids on the island and rats were eradicated between 1993
and 1997 (although around one rat a year manages to find its way ashore and we
were asked to check our bags).
Consequently the bird life is prolific and birdsong accompanied us as we
walked through the bush.
The
Ulva Island forest is denser than most mainland forests as, with no pests or
introduced animals to eat the saplings, young trees thrive. Rimu, totara, miro and rata towered high
while ferns, smaller shrubs and supplejack tangled below. We sat down at Sydney Cove to eat our picnic
lunch and were soon visited by friendly weka and Stewart Island robin, who
hopped around our feet. We could hear
tui and bellbird almost constantly, once or twice a flock of kākā calling
boisterously, and now and then the high-pitched chatter of parakeets—though
photographing the birds proved harder.
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| The daytime kiwi |
After
walking for about an hour and a half we stopped to rest on a seat beside the path. Glancing around I suddenly saw a kiwi, just
metres away on the other side of the track!
I couldn't believe my eyes as I had always thought kiwi were nocturnal. For about fifteen minutes this bird put on a
show for us, plunging her beak deep into holes and jerking out the worms or
grubs she found. Then she would stalk a
few steps closer and try again. Our
photography was once again very poor—the kiwi moved her head and neck so
quickly getting focus was impossible—but just watching was the most amazing
experience. We would probably have
missed the boat back we were so enthralled but some other walkers approached,
so we signalled to them to creep up and we continued on our way. This would have to be the highlight of our
Stewart Island trip. There are around
30-40 kiwi on Ulva Island but are rarely seen, so we felt privileged to have
witnessed this one.
The
track looped back towards Post Office Bay wharf and we saw more birds:
saddleback, grey warbler and a rifleman—but nothing could match the sight of a
kiwi! There had been very few walkers on
the track so it was strange to see a crowd of people at the wharf, they were queuing
to go back to their cruise ship having presumably done a shorter walk. Once they left, our water taxi pulled in and
we were soon whizzing back to Stewart Island.
Again
we took a longer way back to Oban, this time going through the bush of the
Raroa and Fuchsia Walks. They were
pretty bushwalks but had little birdlife in comparison to Ulva Island. Reaching Oban we hobbled into the South Sea
Hotel for a coffee and a rest. We realised we had been walking for six and a
half hours. We hadn't felt tired while
walking on Ulva, with so many birds to spot and try and identify, but didn't
feel like doing too much more. After a
quick visit to the Stewart Island store to buy postcards, we made our way back
to the ferry terminal where we were to book in for the return journey to
Bluff. Unfortunately
a previous ferry had suffered engine problems and returned to Oban. Those passengers went on our ferry, while we
had to wait for repairs to be made to the other boat. The up-side was that we had a comfortable
sofa by the window to rest in, with views of the sandy beaches out to Horseshoe
Point. A couple of little blue penguins
swam ashore and picked their way across the rocks and out of sight. The ferry eventually left more than an hour
behind schedule but it made for a pleasant evening cruise back to Bluff. This boat was bigger than the one we had come
out on, and rode the waves better.
We felt we had experienced a lot on
our day trip to Stewart Island. And
seeing the daytime kiwi was the highlight of our time in the South Island—if not
the whole journey.
Places mentioned in this post - correct at the time of writing
Walks
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Humboldt Falls Track
www.doc.govt.nz/parks-and-recreation/places-to-go/fiordland/places/fiordland-national-park/things-to-do/tracks/humboldt-falls-track
1.2 km return, 30 min,
easy: walking track
Access: Hollyford Rd
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Deep Bay to Golden Bay
Wharf
www.doc.govt.nz/Documents/parks-and-recreation/tracks-and-walks/southland/stewart-island-rakiura-short-walks-brochure.pdf
I hr, easy: walking track
Access: Part of a longer
loop. We started from Wohlers Rd, Oban
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Ulva Island
www.doc.govt.nz/parks-and-recreation/places-to-go/southland/places/stewart-island-rakiura/ulva-island-te-wharawhara/things-to-do/ulva-island-walking-tracks
Post Office Bay to West
End Beach, via History, Conservation and Nature Tracks
2 hr return, easy (but
allow time for bird watching)
Places to visit
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Te Hikoi Southern Journey
172, Palmerston St,
Riverton
www.tehikoi.co.nz
Hours: 10.00 am-5.00 pm
October- April, 10.00 am-4.00 pm May-September
Entry price: adult $8
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E. Hayes Hammer Hardware
168, Dee St, Invercargill
www.ehayes.co.nz
Hours: Monday-Friday 7.30
am-5.00 pm, Saturday 9.00 am-4.00 pm, Sunday 10.00 am-4.00 pm
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Transport World
491, Tay St,
Hawthorndale, Invercargill
www.transportworld.co.nz
Hours: 10.00 am-5.00 pm
Entry price: adult $25,
senior and student $22.50, child $15
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Southland Museum and Art
Gallery
108, Gala St, Queens
Park, Invercargill
www.transportworld.co.nz
Hours: 9.00 am-5.00 pm
Monday-Friday, 10.00 am-5.00 pm Saturday-Sunday
Admission: free, donation
welcomed
