Milford- another great place to spend xmas holiday

The weather continued to be good until we reached Milford Sound. I had won a spot price at Kepler Challenge in December, which gave Charlie and I a free "nature cruise" out through the fiord. It was a cool thing to do, but I wouldn't have liked to pay for it myself. It felt mostly like a money making machine with the boat crew herding us on board like a flock of sheep, shouting at us with speakers about "nature facts" which seemed like plucked out of the air. Well, ignoring the annoying guides, we had some stunning views. It was really fascinating to see the fiord inlet, which is apparently very hard to spot from the ocean. Many ships back in the day missed it, including James Cook and his gang.

The weather was packing in by the time we came back onto the shore and rain started forming cats and dogs (I am sure of it). It rained and rained and rained, the average fall was well maintained. The next day it was still pissing, but we headed out to sea again, this time to do some scuba diving and discover what's below the surface of the sound.

The diving company we went with took us out to the mouth of the sound and I think Charlie was a bit nervous about getting into the water the first time in more than a year. Well, we got down alright after some regular faffing and I think both of us were mostly just getting used to being down there. I can't remember anything especially cool with it. Well, it was cool, very cool. I was freezing. Charlie had probably been too busy worrying about his buoyancy that he had forgot to equalise the pressure in his mask. His face was VERY swollen up inside his mask when he came up and I was wondering if he could even see anything through his squinty eyes. After taking off his mask, his blood capillaries around his eyes had burst from the pressure. I still have a good laugh today when I think about how unbelievably silly he looked all puffed up!

The fiord is unique environment in the way that you have a deep cold fresh water layer (often with a brownish colour from all the tannins from the surrounding forests) fed from all the streams and waterfalls, sitting on top of the marine salt water. It was like looking through thick sugar diluted water when we were diving through the freshwater layer and the visibility improves dramatically once we reached the marine water mass. Since the fresh water layer cuts out a lot of the light, you have a situation with typical deep water species living on relatively shallow waters. The black coral (which is actually white?!) is unique for Milford Sound, where it is found on 10-15 m compared to over 30 m in a normal condition without the freshwater eliminating the light.

The second dive we had was further into the fiord and we felt really comfy with all the diving gear after the "warm-up" dive. It was a special feeling to dive by almost vertical cliffs. I really enjoyed it!!! There were hundreds of tiny fish swarming around us. A few lobsters backed into their hollows when we swam past.




The dive trip ended with a quick swim to shore, where a little tramp took us to a 10 m high waterfall where we had a swim with our masks and snorkels. Since the rain had been pouring down the last 12 hrs, the fall was incredibly powerful and it would have been very painful if it wasn't for the wetsuits. It was such a cool thing to do!! I must say I felt quite funny tramping through the bush with a full wetsuit, booties and a mask.

We left Milford after a couple of really great days on the sea. Time for next adventure!