More relaxing inside as the weather turned cold, rainy and windy! Further inquiry into the tree fuchsia led me to the possum, the most numerous of roadkill we’ve seen throughout NZ! Not to be confused with the North American Opossum, the Possum is a species introduced from Australia in the 1830’s for the fur business. Both are marsupials (carrying their young in a pouch like a kangaroo) but from different families altogether, and I don’t think the American opossum would ever be considered a fur bearer with it’s straggly, thin and very stinky fur! The dead possums here on the roads however look very luxuriant with thick soft looking fur, although I haven’t actually touched a roadkill possum I have to admit.

An image of a live possum from the internet.

Them being nocturnal, we haven’t seen any possum, but they do terrible damage to the forests and native animals of NZ. They eat flowers, berries, seeds and bark but they are opportunistic feeders and will eat eggs, chicks and insects too! They have damaged whole tracts of Tree Fuchsia and eliminated them from some areas! More info on the Possum is HERE. The Possum is trapped throughout NZ and it’s fur is used to manufacture very soft and warm Merino wool/Possum fur garments!

While relaxing today I delved into some of the things we learned during our 3 days of guided hikes. One thing in particular is the Tree Fuchsia, the largest member of my favorite flowering shrub, the fuchsia. This is a native NZ tree and one that is deciduous, losing it’s leaves in the winter. Only 11 of the 260 native NZ trees are deciduous! Most trees in NZ are evergreen, we’ll have to spend a winter here to see what that’s like!

This tree fuchsia was along the Milford Track. The Tree Fuchsia has distinctive orangish peeling bark.

These trees can grow up to 40 ft. tall, with a trunk circumference of about 3 feet. Yet the flower is tiny but packs a nectar punch, feeding the tui and numerous other birds.

Wow, what an exciting 3 days! We are exhausted! Luckily we are moving only about 5 blocks away to a small house in a residential area, away from the hustle and bustle of busloads of tourists on their way too and from Milford Sound! We treated ourselves to a leisurely lunch at the Hotel Cafe after we packed the car with our bags.

Of course we ordered food too! We shared the local pan-fried blue cod and chips! Delicious!

We woke up to a beautiful view of the mountains, with a dusting of snow overnight!

What a view from our hotel room!

We had enough time to breakfast at the buffet before our pick-up at 9:30am. We picked up a full load of hikers, 12 for this trip, that starts with a helicopter ride up to Luxemore Hut on the Kepler Track! We were driven to the helicopter pad just out of town and Robert volunteered us to ride in the small 4 person copter, us, one guide and the pilot and we took off over Lake Te Anau and up to the Hut!

Flying over the alpine glacially carved lakes.

The Other 10 hikers and one more guide were flown over in two trips on a larger helicopter.

A stop motion panorama of the 2nd copter taking off to return to Te Anau.

From the Hut we all started hiking up towards Mount Luxemore Peak, through the alpine tussock environment. We were glad for the clouds, but it was pretty cold and the dusting of snow was slowly melting.

The views across the long arm of Lake Te Anau to the Murchison Mountains was fantastic!

We reached the turning point, a big rock at the edge of the trail from which you can get a photo of yourself with a view of the Southern Alps in all their snow dusted beauty in the background, a view which was completely obstructed by clouds today! We backtracked down the trail towards the Hut and had another brief encounter with a lone Kea who we observed snatching something from some hikers who were lunching on the trail.

It is highly discouraged to feed the Kea and our guide reprimanded the hikers for allowing the bird to get close to an open container!

We reached the Hut and had another wonderful lunch and a much appreciated hot beverage! After warming up and filling up we started down the trail as the sun finally began burning off the clouds.

We reached tree line and entered the beech forest, thankful for the shade as the sun was high and getting hot!

The 4.5 miles downhill through the lush, moss-enveloped forest with thick fern undergrowth went quickly and we reached Brod Bay on Lake Te Anau. The water taxi was waiting for us and we got a quick photo.

What’s wrong with this picture?

We landed at the dock just a block from our hotel so we said goodbye to our guides and fellow hikers and walked home to celebrate the conclusion of our 3 days, 19.5 miles total, excursions on a few of The Great Walks of NZ!

Part 1; Water, Water, Everywhere!

A very early rainy morning, starting with a cold boxed breakfast delivered by the hotel last night. We met our guide at 6:30am in the lobby, the same guide today, but different guests that we picked up soon after. Our guide drove for 2 hours this morning along the same road as yesterday, but all the way to Milford Sound.

We stopped at the entrance to Homer Tunnel which is one-way now because of the sizes of tourist buses and camper vans. We had to wait a few minutes for the opposing traffic to exit the tunnel which gave us time to snap some photos of the ephemeral waterfalls, many of which run only in the rain!

We arrived at 8:30am to an empty parking lot at the tiny Village of Milford Sound, home to about 120 people, most of who work in the tourist industry and are temporary residents. We gathered our belongings and donned the offered rain pants and rain jackets since it was still raining! We caught a water taxi that jetted us across Freshwater Basin and up the entrance to the Arthur River to a small landing that is the start (or end) of the oldest of Nz’s Great Walks, Milford Track. We started our hike following the Arthur River and crossing several creeks, over bridges and wading ankle deep through them!

Sometimes the track looked like this!

We were warned by the guide company to bring a change of clothes and shoes!

The rainforest is lush owing to between 15.5″ to almost 24″ of rain per month, yet temperatures range from about 35F in winter to only 67F in summer.

There were waterfalls everywhere we looked, cascading down the granite cliffs. Notice the two hikers at the bottom center, giving scale to the size of the waterfalls!

Our destination at the 3 mile mark was Giants Gate waterfall, best seen from the swing bridge crossing the river.

We had our lunch at the shelter just past the bridge, along with a hot beverage again!

Part 2; Cruising the Sound

We backtracked on the same trail as the weather began to clear. We reached the water taxi landing in time to catch the boat back to the village.

As we crossed Freshwater Basin we got a view of Bowen Falls, the highest and most powerful waterfall in Milford Sound. It is both the water source and electricity source to Milford Sound Village via a hydropower station.

At the village we changed into our dry clothes (and shoes, in my case jandals {flip-flops}!).We had just enough time to board a larger boat for a cruise on Milford Sound!

More waterfalls in the more narrow and short fiord than Doubtful Sound.

As we neared the entrance to the sound on the Tasman Sea the sun was shining and the rough waves through the narrows calmed to a roll.

The water turned a beautiful teal color as we passed an area with lighter colored rocks flowing down to a small beach.

This area was mentioned by the skipper as a site of particularly rare and translucent Pounamu, or greenstone, also know as jade. Highly prized by Maori and carved into weapons as well as jewelry, it is a Kiwi tradition to wear and gift Pounamu.

We reached the Tasman Sea and the boat turned back at St. Anne Point, the rounded rock at the point.

Returning to the Village the sun was shining to round out a wonderful day.

Part 3; Icing on the Cake!

On our drive back towards Te Anau our guide spotted activity in a parking lot and we turned around to check it out. It was a group of 3 Kea, the iconic alpine parrot of NZ!

A 6 mile hike, a 2 hour cruise, 4 hours being driven through beautiful landscape, meeting the curious, intelligent iconic Kea up close, all in the company of my best friend and husband! A great day!