Te Wāhipounamu

Franz Josef Glacier

Te Wāhipounamu (Māori for "the place of greenstone") encompasses much of the southwest corner of the South Island of New Zealand, and includes the National Parks of Aoraki/Mount Cook, Fiordland, Mount Aspiring, and Westland. According to Wikipedia, "It is thought to contain some of the best modern representations of the original flora and fauna present in Gondwanaland, one of the reasons for listing as a World Heritage Site."

Much of the Site is mountainous, with soaring, jagged peaks that seem to rise almost vertically from nothing, and deep glacier-carved valleys. The most famous peaks include the tallest mountain in New Zealand, Mount Cook, and Mitre Peak, which looks somewhat like a Bishop's Hat, or mitre. I travelled south along the West Coast of the island, and entered the Site proper at the little village of Franz Josef, so named for the Franz Josef Glacier which is within walking distance from the village, and a popular tourist destination. The glacier is rare in that it descends down to just 300 metres above sea level, down to the level of the temperate rainforest that covers much of the West Coast, and makes for a relatively easy hike to the terminal face.

Homer Tunnel

After Franz Josef, it was on to Queenstown. I took a day trip out to Milford Sound, "New Zealand's most famous tourist destination", and the 4 hour drive out to the Sound from Queenstown is absolutely stunning and not to be missed. The only comparison I can make is to the Rocky Mountains, but even as the Rockies rise quite a bit higher, the mountains here seem almost indescribably enormous as we drive through valley after valley, with vertical walls of rock surrounding us for most of the journey.

I was lucky enough to travel out to Milford Sound on a relatively sunny and cloudless day, which was fortunate indeed when you consider that the West Coast gets almost 7 metres of rain a year, and is one of the wettest places on the planet! All that rain supports a dense, sprawling temperate rain forest that covers much of the valley floor on the drive out to the Sound.

After spending much of the drive skirting around the base of the peaks, we came to Homer Tunnel, a kilometre-long hole punched through the Homer Saddle, providing the only road access into Milford Sound. We stopped here to take some pictures, and after travelling through the tunnel we were greeted with my favourite view of the day, several hundred metres up from the valley floor, looking out on the vast valley and the network of switchback roads that would take us down and onward toward the Sound.

Beautiful view from the NW exit to Homer Tunnel

On the boat out in the middle of Milford Sound