Thursday, February 18, 2009
Today was our day to go down to Fiordland and take a cruise of Doubtful Sound, which is really a fiord and not at all a sound. Fiords are glacial valleys filled by seas. A Sound is typically an inlet of a sea. Sounds are typically wider and shallow where Fiords tend to be more narrow and much more deep. Whatever.
We got up around 5:15 a.m. since we were suppose to be picked up at 6:35 a.m. We ended up waiting over 10 minutes and a taxi finally picked us up. We were a little worried that we were going to end up paying for a taxi because our expectation was that the Real Journey’s tour was paying for our transportation, but when we got to the Real Journey’s office there was no reason for us to worry. They must enlist with taxi services to pick up different individuals. The tour bus eventually left the office at 7:15 a.m. to take us to Manapouri where we would take a boat across Lake Manapouri then drive through the Wilmot pass where we would pick up our final boat for Doubtful Sound.
As we were asked to board the tour bus, these two women ran in front of us to get to the bus to get on first. I made some smart comment like “guess there isn’t going to be enough seats on the bus.” As it turns out, they had to sit in the front seat of every single vehicle we boarded. Every time we changed transportation, these two crazy ladies go running so they could sit up front. On the boat across Lake Manapouri, the two ladies had to go to the bathroom so bad they opted to stop at the restroom rather than get to the boat. By the time these two lovelies arrived, they were lucky to even get a seat, much less sit together, much less sit in the front seats. Here is where it goes real bad. On the return crossing, we ended up sitting up front with another couple. When these two fine ladies boarded the vessel, they manage to squeeze up front with us. Halfway into the crossing, one of these fine individuals decides to give herself a manicure. The front window of the boat was open causing a breeze to send her filings straight into Troy’s face. He walked away disgusted, but a short while later it gets real crazy where she a moved on to her toenails. Everyone was looking at her like the freak she was. Enough about these two darlings!
The scenery was beautiful, but the only wild life we saw was fur seals. We were hoping to see bottlenose dolphins, but the Tasman Sea was too calm, which supposedly kept the dolphins from seeking refuge in the Fiord. After our 3-hour trip in the “sound”, we were taken 99 meters underground to see the Manapouri Underground Power Station.
We originally thought, “whatever”, but it turned out quite interesting. Originally, the proposal was to raise Lake Manapouri 100 meters and have the water flow through the hydro-generators before spilling into Doubtful. Fortunately for the environment, hundreds of thousands of signatures were collected, resulting in the power station being built into the mountain, 99 meters down, rather than disrupting the natural flow of Lake Manapouri.
We returned to the apartment around 7:30 p.m. to a wonderful dinner that Mike and Rita had prepared for us. During one of our bus rides back Troy told informed me about a conversation he had with Mike and Rita. It went something along the lines of if you had to choose to eat from only 3 major food groups, which three categories of food would you select. After dinner the conversation picked up again. Each of us then declared our three categories, with a baseline of as much or as many fruits and vegetables. I decided on grains, beans (legumes) and dairy. Mike kept insisting on Oysters, which Troy and Rita found quite laughable telling him he could not live on Oysters, so he finally landed with grains, beans (legumes) and pork. Troy settled on grains, beans (legumes) and fish while Rita picked grains, dairy and fish. This resulted in a bet for March – eat only from your three categories. Good Luck!!!
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