3/21 - Milford Sound and the Kindness of Strangers

The road to Milford Sound.

My first view of the Sound (technically a Fiord) itself:

Milford Sound is incredibly beautiful. There is nowhere else on earth I've been that has quite the same level of blow-you-away amazing views, and the sheer scale of it is astounding. The mind, I think tries constantly to put things into a scale it can understand, and so with things that don't fit that scale - either too small or too big, the brain shrinks or enlarges them to fit. The road to Milford, and the Fiord itself, were prime examples of the minimizing powers of the brain. The nature here is absolutely immense. It completely dwarfs the human presence, but unless you are really paying attention, you can let your brain fool you. The waterfalls, for instance, looked tiny. One, as tall as a fifty story building, looked like a tiny little streamlet...until one of the big cruise ships got near it and looked like a little toy boat underneath it. In general, in my pictures, I tried as much as I could to include a human-made object in them for scale.

On the way, I ended up chatting with a couple who are retired and sailing around the world on their sailboat over a four-year period. I mostly talked to the woman. She had lots of strong opinions to offer about many things. It was definitely interesting to ask her questions about her lifestyle. After a bit, though, I really just wanted to enjoy the natural spectacle, and I eventually excused myself to go take pictures.

After the boat tour I picked up yet more hitchers. There were a couple from the Czech Republic and a guy from Israel who had just finished up the Milford track. This great track is the hardest to do. Not because it's a difficult walk - in fact it's one of the easiest. Its ease and the incredible beauty of its scenery means it is the most in demand. It must be done in a tightly controlled 4 day schedule, and day walks are not allowed. One needs to book it weeks to months in advance in order to get a spot. The finish of the track is right near Milford Sound. And many of the backpackers look for rides back to Te Anau (the town nearest the beginning of the hike).

We had an interesting conversation on the way back. The Israeli and I talked about the medicine in Israel. He said that medicine was one of the most difficult fields to get into in Israel, even though there aren't enough doctors in the country. He had recently finished
his tour of duty in the military - 3 years - and was now traveling prior to starting an engineering degree in university. He hadn't seen any direct action in the recent offensive in Gaza nor in the war with Lebanon, but he had friends who had. He was rather dryly ironic about his reserve status ("I'm not sad that I didn't see any action, since I get to go to any war that happens in the next ten years") and about the role of the US in the reigon ("The US supplies like 90% of Israel's weapons instead of using the money to feed people"). Interesting guy.

After dropping the hitchers off at the same hostel I had stayed in, I continued along the road to Queenstown. I had made a plan to drive through to Wanaka, where I'd booked a hostel for the night. I wanted to see a place just outside of Wanaka called Puzzling World which has a number of large optical illusions. It was recommended, somewhat with tongue-in-cheek, by Hilary's friend John in Seattle.

About an hour outside of Te Anau, I saw a woman at the side of the road with a small sign (which I couldn't read). I pulled over thinking she might be a hitcher. Now, when driving, since I finished Tolstoy on my way to Te Anau, I've listening to music, which I blast. When I stopped this time I had Wagner blasting and the woman, MJ, and her husband, Hamish, both in their 40s, walked up to the car somewhat circumspectly as I struggled to shut the iPod off. When I finally stopped Sigfried during the forging of his sword, MJ and Hamish explained that they had taken a trip down to fish and play golf and heading home to Queenstown had been involved deeply in conversation so they didn't notice that their car was almost out of gas. They asked me to give them a ride up to the next little town to get gas. I readily agreed and Hamish hopped in, MJ waiting with the car. On the way, we ran into a flock of sheep who had apparently missed their turn-off into their paddock, and were walking all over the road. At Hamish's urging I passed the several cars backed up behind the sheep and started pushing slowly through them. Hamish said it's the only way to get past them. And, indeed, they did get out of the way.

We reached the station, and Hamish at first tried to insist that I just drop him off and he would flag a ride back. However, he was a rather big guy, and had just spent a day in the sun, and so was a bit disheveled looking. It may have taken some time to get a ride. So I gently insisted that I would be happy to take him back. He accepted, then said that I should come home and have dinner with them. I happily accepted this offer. On returning to their car, I realized that they didn't have a funnel to pour the fuel into their tank. I looked around my car for something to use, but when I turned my head back the two had already come up with a solution - cutting a plastic water bottle's bottom off, and within a couple of minutes we were underway. They stopped and filled their tank, and asked about my diet. MJ used to lead hiking tours and suspected, since I was American, I might be vegetarian.

We reached their house at around 7:30 in the evening. Wanaka is about an hour's drive from Queenstown, so I was thinking about how I would need to call the hostel to plan on leaving me a late key, when Hamish said that he and MJ had talked it over and wanted to ask me to stay the night. I called the hostel, and they kindly agreed to allow me to cancel my reservation. So I settled in to a lovely evening with MJ and Hamish.

While making a salad MJ kept me company, while Hamish prepared a grilled dinner of freshly caught cod and hulumie cheese (yum!). MJ currently works in real-estate. Hamish owns a tile shop, selling to home builders. So both are kind of connected to the tourism industry, like much of the Queenstown economy. They said that New Zealand didn't really experience a big slow-down from the sub-prime bank crisis, the Christchurch earthquake has put a severe dent in their economy. Queenstown, though, has been doing well. After dinner we watched a locally made film of images from Fiordland. Many of the images almost seem to be CGI generated they are so amazing. The mountain sequences looked like the beginning of LotR The Two Towers.

Finally this very full day came to an end. I'm very grateful for meeting MJ and Hamish. They were completely amazing and generous. I can only hope that I will be able to act as gracefully if and when I get into a difficult situation.