Day Fifteen - Milford Sound to Queenstown

day_fifteen
Originally uploaded by bpelley.

We awoke early this morning to the sound of pouring rain. It rains over 6 meters annually in Milford so it was certainly not surprising. Unfortunately, the weather put the kibosh on the kayaking we had hoped to do in the morning, but we still got to cruise around the Sound again and see all the new waterfalls that had sprung up since the night before due to the rain. Patrick was very happy to take a shower and change into some clean clothes. When we were returning to the dock around 8:30am, we were overtaken by an enormouse cruise ship, the Pacific Princess. While we knew this was an enormous boat, compared to the size of the Sound the boat seemed tiny.

We got off the boat around 9am and then boarded a bus back to Queenstown. The ride back was relaxing and very scenic. We made a few stops along the way for photo ops, bird watching, lunch and gourmet ice creams. Our driver, Ben, provided very funny commentary during the entire trip.

We arrived back in Queenstown in the early afternoon and checked back into our hotel. We both enjoyed hot showers, emptying our backpacks and changing into some clean clothes. We headed for the bookstore (Bonney is out of books!) and were shocked by the book sticker prices. We don't know why, but books are VERY expensive here. This fact may prevent Bonney from ever considering NZ as a residence. We picked up a couple of classics (they were a bit cheaper) and then had a wonderful seafood dinner. Tomorrow, we pick up our campervan and head north!

For more pictures from Day Fifteen, click here.