Two of the most popular excursions in Fjiordland are the day trips to Milford Sound and Doubtful Sound. Both are named ‘sounds’ but are actually fjiords. Milford Sound is the most popular; Doubtful Sound is larger and more inaccessible. Fortunately we had the time to visit both this trip and didn’t have to choose. Yesterday we went to Milford Sound, and today was our excursion to Doubtful Sound.
The starting point is at Pearl Harbour in Manapouri, a 20 minute drive from Te Anau. We left our bnb around 9:15am to allow extra time to find parking etc, although that’s not really an issue here.
Got our passes and boarded the boat at 10am. From Manapouri it’s a 45 minute boat ride across Lake Manapouri to West Arm. We had seats up top, more to be outside. The view was okay, similar to any lake with little islands. There were about 120 tourists on the excursion.
Then we switched to three buses for the 45 minute drive across Wilmot’s Pass to Deep Cove. At the pass, the buses stopped so everyone could get pics of Doubtful Sound. It was a steep downhill from there to Deep Cove (pop. 2). In Deep Cove we boarded a catamaran for the tour of Doubtful Sound. We grabbed a couple bench seats on the top deck.
Doubtful Sound was named when Captain Cook, exploring in 1770, thought it would be doubtful if he could make it back out to the Tasman Sea if he entered the sound, based on the prevailing winds.
It was mostly cloudy as we pulled away. It then got windy, and finally a bit rainy. This drove most of the other folks to the lower decks. The weather then cleared up, with the sun poking out, but the other folks remained on the lower decks, leaving just a handful of us up top.
As the sun came through and the clouds lifted, the mountains came into view. It was really cool to go down the sound. It’s generally a bit wider and not and tall as Milford, but it does have some really narrow sections. It also has a few arms that we explored down (First Arm and Crooked Arm).
The coolest part was approaching the Tasman Sea past Shelter Islands. It looks like you’re dropping off the end of the earth, like some sort of flat earth rendering. I’m not sure what causes this illusion, maybe it’s the freshwater meeting the sea. It wasn’t until we were about 500m away that you could finally see the Tasman Sea. The water got rougher so we reversed and went back up the sound.
Overall I’d say Milford Sound was a more impressive sight; and Doubtful Sound a cooler experience. In First Arm the captain turned off the engines so we could experience the ‘sound of silence’ (I'm pretty sure the pun was intended). It was still a bit windy so I wouldn’t call it silence, but it was still pretty cool.
Then we retraced our journey back home, 45 minutes by bus and 45 minutes by boat. We slept through most of it. We still had to drive 20 minutes to get back to the bnb. (Some people then board a bus for a 2.5 hour drive back to Queenstown!)
It was another full day excursion, and again well worth it.
Had dinner at Ristorante Paradiso, which was okay Italian food. They did make the best espresso we’ve had this trip though.
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