I came to Milford Sound with Matt eight years ago and really enjoyed the trip. It's one of the most famous tourist destinations in New Zealand and Claire and I both had slight reservations that somewhere like this couldn't quite live up to the hype. We shouldn't have worried. The place is amazing and deserves all the accolades it recieves!

After a lazy morning (we didn't catch that YHA special offer at 8:55am!) we wandered down to the dock to check out the tour ferry competition. There were a load to choose from and, eventually, we decided to go for the one with Red Boats with the food and Milford Deep included.

We don't usually go for the tour trips but this was really good. We started on the free coffee and tea before hitting the BBQ burgers, potatoes, sausages and salad. Yum! We made a good choice of boat! The commentary was great and informed us all about the glacial formation of the sound (a fjord technically, but the discoverers didn't know what a fjord was so we'll let them off!) and it's surrounding mountains. The Mitre Peak is a massive 1600m mountain that just comes straight out of the sound. This is the kind of place that the South Island is all about. The dramatic scenery is breathtaking and we were lucky enough to get clear skies. If it does rain, however, the cliffs turn into incredible waterfalls (10,000 of them) which must be one hell of a sight.

We made it all the way out to the Tasman Sea where we were greeted with sunshine and a slight swell. They Captain said we they get 10m swells here and something rediculous like 250km/h winds! What a wild place.

On the way back in through the fjord we stopped at a 700m overhanging cliff and looked backwards over our heads at it! Next the Captain's speciality: at the Stirling Falls he got the willing punters to stand right at the front of his catermaran while he drove the boat closer and closer into the foot of these fantastic falls! We got completely soaked by the fresh water as it hit the fjord and was driven horizontally towards us. We got about 10ft away from the cliff and the noise and wind was incredible. The patterns on the sea were amazing, concentric rings of little waves with radial lines of white water rushing over them!

After drying off a little we proceeded to Milford Deep. This is an underwater observatory where you walk down to a chamber 9m below the surface. Milford Sound has an unusual phenomenum of brown fresh water sitting on top of the salty sea water. This blocks out much of the light causing black corals (white when alive, black when dead) to live at 9 or 10m depth instead of 40m or so. The day we went there hadn't been rain for about 5 days (practically a drought they claimed!) so there was more light than usual penetrating to the 9m depths. This made for some great pale blue colours and lots of fish! Last time I came here it was very dark and I wasn't too impressed - this time I thought it was fascinating and a great experience!

What a great trip!

We wandered around the coastal walk before heading back to the hostel. We finished the night by going on the glow worm trail at the hostel. We wandered around the nature walk only seeing a single possum ("Geoffrey") before turning back a little disappointed. We then saw masses of glowworms right at the beginning of the trail! They were quite good, but you can only get so excited about some glowing knats. Some drunk people wandered past and thought my camera lights were glow worms and came stumbling in to have a look! Very funny!