17-18.12. - Day 11-12 - Two Days/One Night with Kayaking in Doubtful Sound (+ 2 Unspectacular Days in Queenstown)

During dinner in Manapouri, we found out amusingly that the constant rain was expected to continue in the area for a few more days, and the temperatures would drop even further, to around 4 degrees at night. Perfect conditions for a two-day kayaking tour with 5 degrees warm (or rather cold) fjord water and camping on a lonely island. We went to bed somewhat skeptical, only to wake up at 6(!!) am the next morning and realize that it had actually stopped raining and there was not a cloud in the sky so far, at least.

We had booked the kayaking tour through 'Go Orange', an outdoor adventure provider, and thanks to numerous blog posts we had read beforehand, we were well informed about the course of the tour.

First, we took a boat from Manapouri's harbor across the vast 'Lake Manapouri'. Upon arrival at the end of the lake, a bus took us over a bumpy pass for another hour directly to Doubtful Sound.

At the small watersports center there, we first met Charlotte, our guide for the next few days, a funny New Zealander in her mid-twenties, whose favorite phrase 'How is it going team' we would hear very often in the coming days, as well as our fellow travelers, three Englishmen, two Australians, and one Korean. From the beginning, it was a fun group with whom we had a lot of fun in the coming days, but also discussed a lot about Chinese politics, Brexit, the scientific system, etc., a pleasant and great mix.

Charlotte also immediately handed out our equipment: thermal shirts, long wetsuits, fleece jackets, hats, sun hats, spray skirts for the kayak, a rain jacket, and of course, life jackets. We also received two waterproof bags in which we could pack our food, sleeping bags, pillows, etc. Additionally, all equipment such as tents, sleeping mats, stoves, pots, lighting, etc., that we would need for the next nine days, was distributed evenly among the four double kayaks. Charlotte had the emergency equipment onboard. After a brief technical introduction on the gravel beach of Doubtful Sound, we were already packed in our waterproof gear and ready to go on the water, which made us all very happy, as there was a massive 'sandfly' plague on land.

These nasty little creatures, better known in German as sandflies or midges, prefer to appear in swarms. You can find them all over New Zealand, but they especially like places near water. Since this is the rainiest spring and summer in years, you can imagine the number of black insects that immediately attack any exposed skin. A few hours later, the bites swell up and itch for days (although they are otherwise harmless). The only remedy is large amounts of insect repellent (smells and tastes disgusting) or covering all exposed skin (there are particularly fancy net covers for the head ;-) ). However, no matter how hard you try, you simply can't avoid being attacked and you are just glad as soon as you can escape into or onto the water or into enclosed spaces/tents.

So our kayaking group was relieved when we finally started paddling on the water, fully loaded. It was not raining, there was no wind, and the fjord water lay flat like a mirror at the foot of the towering rainforest mountains. In these dreamlike conditions, which later became partly sunny, we silently glided further into Milford Sound. Absolute silence, only interrupted by the splashing of our paddle strokes or the occasional conversation. Charlotte was a great guide who let us paddle close to the waterfalls that cascaded down from the fjord forest at numerous locations, hundreds of meters high. We saw Paradise Duck families and various songbirds. The highlight, however, was definitely a group of dolphins, which circled around our boats after a few hours of paddling, jumping out of the water in a picture-perfect manner.

So the hours passed. Around noon, we landed on a wild beach where you would have liked to spend the whole afternoon in a visually wild and romantic setting. However, due to the sandflies, we ate there as quickly as possible and were glad to be back on the boat soon. In the late afternoon, after about 18 kilometers of paddling, we reached the end of the fjord arm we had chosen and thus approached the island where we wanted to set up our tents for the night. After carrying the fully loaded boats out of the water, the next challenge awaited us: setting up the tents, washing ourselves and the wetsuit in the freezing cold fjord water, and changing into dry clothes amidst a sandfly invasion, all in fast forward mode. We were even happier when we could take shelter in the man-high net tent that 'Go Orange' had set up on the island, a mosquito-free zone.

There, we 'cooked' (or poured boiling water over our freeze-dried food), shared the wine we brought, as well as various sweets, and chatted. We planned to wake up at 6.00 am the next morning to be on time for the bus and boat transfer back to the starting point, so we did not stay up too late in the evening. However, before we could snuggle up in our warm sleeping bags and fall into a deep sleep, we had to master two more challenges: a visit to the compost toilet accompanied by relentless sandflies (really unpleasant) and a hunt for the sandflies in the tent (a bloody affair). After that, peace returned to the island until we were woken up at six o'clock the next morning by Charlotte.

After a quick breakfast, we packed everything waterproof back into the kayaks and were once again happy to be back on the water, even though the sandflies were not as active in the morning. In the mist and drizzle, we slowly made our way back, creating a completely different atmosphere than the day before, which gave the fjord landscape an almost mystical touch. This time, there was also headwind and thus a current, which made paddling a bit more sporty.

When we reached our original starting point at noon, we were all pretty frozen, exhausted, tired, and bitten, but above all, happy to have spent those two days undisturbed in Doubtful Sound. Even though as visitors, we always leave some trace, no matter how hard we try not to interfere with the system, hopefully, such forms of sustainable tourism contribute to raising and deepening the understanding of the beauty and need for protection of the remaining nature on our planet.

From 18-20.12, i.e., Day 12-14, we stayed in Queenstown, which doesn't really have much to talk about, and I won't dedicate a separate post to it. It is not a very pretty little town, beautifully located on Lake Wakatipu, where a lot of partying is going on and rightfully enjoys the reputation as the Mallorca of the South Island. We spent two nights in a warm hostel room there, read a lot, slept, did laundry, had dinner twice (including at the legendary 'Fergburger'), and restocked our supplies for the upcoming 4-day tour. The most exciting thing during this time was to persuade the local optician to sell me a large package of daily contact lenses without a prescription since my (old travel) glasses disintegrated into their individual parts on the kayaking tour and have since been adorned with a support bandage made of duct tape.