Distinction Te Anau

... could break it into biospheres and talk about how there are temperate rainforests, coastal beach forests, grassland river valleys, and alpine uplands, but it really is just a poor attempt at describing a place where reality outperforms your imagination. The rhythm of the road is quite dramatic as well because there is a sort of build up of scenery the closer you get to Milford Sound. We decided to camp at Lake Gunn which is one of the last camp ...

... happening. I tear a few pages out of the journal I've been keeping and burn the rest, which only last for a few minutes, and then it's right back into the cold. I use my gas burner ring to cook up some soup, and it's into the sleeping bag for the night. It's cold and damp, and I just can't get to sleep. Apart from that, there are noises outside. Strange noises. And I know I'm being ridiculous, but some of them sound like they're even coming from inside the hut, from right next to me. What ...

Jack: 20 mins forth to Te Anau to use info centers and book a glow worm tour for the evening and then phoned Joella to book us on Doubtful Sound overnight cruise tomorrow when the weather will be awful,and we are assured the views will be better. 10 mins back to Rainbow Reach for a 3 hour walk to Motorau Hut . Lunch first in the car park, cheese tomato and salami sandwiches. Walk ...

... of rainforest, coastal fiords and granite mountains that form this part of the world. Several people have emphatically recommended this to us along the way since we arrved in NZ. "Ata Whenua" has been filmed over 10 years across the seasons and is spectacular - so much so that we who buy no souvenirs apart from the odd postcard or fridge magnet are compelled to buy the DVD so that we might share some of these wonderful sights with people at home. The main guy was so ...

... work despite 2 winches with 2 people winding each winch. We tacked about a dozen times and I did one of the tacks! We even set the spinnaker. It was impressive sailing about 25 degrees off the wind and anyone who wanted to got to steer. The were about 9 of us onboard, together with 4 crew. In the evening we got to see 'The Remarkables', a chain of mountains on the far side of Lake Wakatipu. 25 Feb - Chris ...

... us (now all geared up) across the wilmot pass (22km), some of the most expensive to build gravel road in NZ which takes you over a mountain, through a rain forest and is only accessible by boat, built not for us but for a hydro electric power station that provides 14% of New Zealands power. We then got in KAYAKS and spent the rest of the day, apart from lunch kayaking around stunning, isolated and amazing doubtful sound. It ...

... ran down<br>all the rules about no photography at all in the cave, no lights, no<br>talking, no touching, since all of the above would make the glowworms<br>turn off. So the entrance was pretty dangerous in "American" tourist<br>terms, we had to walk through the tiny cave entrance about 4ft high,<br>and down dimly lit pathways. There was a lot of gushing waterways under<br>us which was also ...

... to stay tonight in a 'Top 10 Holiday Park' (essentially a glorified camp site!), which has won a few awards so we thought we'd give it a try.<br><br>The place was half-dead when we arrived, so we had our lunch and headed out to see what the town had to offer. <br><br>We decided the best way of doing this was to hire a couple of moutnain bikes from the reception, and a few ...

... end of the Routeburn, and also made it up to Lake Marian, a splendid glacial tarn surrounded by kilometre high rock walls. Andy has been up there before but in murky conditions, but that day was crystal clear and well worth the sweaty clamber up. The birdlife is also good fun; territorial robins inspect you at intervals (pecking at shoe laces), fantails squeak abuse and tiny riflemen whizz by. We continued on to worship in the presence of Milford Sound - hazy but awesome ...