Saturday - Doubtful Sound

Nancy—uncharacteristically--was the first one to rise on the bunk-room deck this morning, and thus got into the shower room before anyone else had left puddles on the floor.

The breakfast buffet included all the usual choices, plus the flakiest and butteriest croissants we have had on our trip.

Yesterday’s driving rain let up during the night, so going out on the deck this morning was not as perilous as it had been yesterday. We had much nicer views of the green mountains around us and even caught a few glimpses of blue sky.

The crew unfurled the sails for a while, but mostly relied on the engines to keep the ship moving.

Sails unfurled--for only a moment

Naturalist and second mate

The ship’s naturalist also served as second mate. When we visited the pilot house, she was relieving the captain at the … what? Wheel? Control board?

Listening to the sounds of silence

A little later this morning, the captain steered us to the end of Crooked Arm on the south side of Doubtful Sound and cut the motor. The naturalist invited the passengers to come out on deck, and then asked the captain to turn off the ship’s generator as well as the engines. Once the ship was quiet, she asked everyone to remain silent and very still so we could contemplate the glories of nature as we listened only to the sound of the sea. It was a rather moving experience. As he scanned the scenery, Michael counted no less than fifty waterfalls plummeting down the mountains surrounding us (one advantage of all that rain yesterday).

Some of the 50 waterfalls in Crooked Arm

But alas, the generators eventually had to come back on, the engines started up again, and the passengers went back to talking and snapping photos. All too soon it was time to gather our belongings and prepare to disembark.

Unloading the used linens

When we arrived back at the dock, the first order of business was to allow the crew time and space to unload the bags containing all our used linens. (In preparation for the next cruise, they had changed the beds while we ate breakfast.)

Then the crew members lined up in the light rain (Downton Abbey style) to say farewell to each passenger as we disembarked.

The crew bids goodbye to the passengers

We boarded the busses and began retracing our journey across Wilmot Pass by bus, across Lake Manapouri by ferry, and by bus back to Queenstown. 





We had a enough of a layover in Te Anau that we could grab a quick lunch at the appropriately named Pop In Cafe.

Drop In Cafe

The loo for refined men

The final bus deposited us at the Queenstown Airport in plenty of time for our flight back to Auckland. We would have a short layover in Wellington on the way.

From their accents, we could tell that the two couples seated in the row behind us on the plane were Americans. Since one of the group was sporting a BYU baseball cap as well as BYU flip flops, we introduced ourselves as BYU graduates and asked what had brought them to New Zealand. We learned that all four had attended BYU and that three of them had just run a half marathon in Queenstown. The fourth, who was planning to participate in the New Zealand Iron Man contest next weekend—the impetus for their whole trip--was hoping that the broken toe he had suffered a few days earlier would not prevent him from competing.

Welcome to Wellington, My Precious!

The airport in Wellington greets visitors with a huge banner that says, “Welcome to Middle Earth.” Even though we knew that this town had proudly served as home base for the filming of The Lord of the Rings, it was still a little creepy to find Gollum observing our every move inside the terminal.

And was the sign over the toilets intended for hobbits?

Unfortunately, all we saw of Wellington was the airport and the view from the plane window. (Next time!) We were happy, however, to see DeEtte and Art again and get back to our “home” in Auckland.