Veronika Wild

The adventure begins  Apologies for the break in transmission. My sister has just launched her second book and of course I just had to stop and read it. More about that shortly, but for now I just want to tell you about Milford Sound while it's still relatively fresh in my mind. Much as I hate to admit it, Milford Sound proved to be better than I expected. Even if you don’t get to see anything else but Queenstown Airport, you should go and see this. Rudyard Kipling called it the 8 th Wonder of the World when he called by during his 1891 visit to New Zealand. It turns out that Milford Sound, and for that matter Doubtful Sound, are not sounds at all but fjords, though the terms are often used interchangeably and both refer to large bodies of water that penetrate far inland. You would probably have to dive beneath them to know for sure, something those who named them probably could not do, but the very steep evenly carved sides here do provide a clue. They have...

The Mirror Lakes - an obligatory stop on the Milford Road Morning dawns and I follow the crowd through Te Anau Downs, the Eglington Valley, past the Mirror Lakes and to the Divide. The Divide is where a mighty glacier once ploughed down from the Darran Mountains and split into three creating the Eglington, Greenstone and Hollyford valleys. Generally I like to avoid the must –do tourist meccas. In fact, I especially booked the less   -travelled   Doubtful Sound   instead, but as I was doing so the operators threw in a Milford Sound Cruise with their sister company for very little more, so how could I refuse? Besides, a nagging little voice in my head was saying, “How can you come all this way and not see it? It’ll be like going to Paris and not seeing the Eiffel Tower.“ So here I was, following everyone like a sheep. The road is narrow and as usual there really aren’t any other places to stop. The song "You'll never Walk Alone" springs to mind ...