Thursday was the grand finale. We took a tour to Milford Sound, a beautiful fjord on the west coast that empties into the Tasman Sea. It is located in the Fjordland National Park, a 3 million acre park that is a UNESCO World Heritage Site with all the protections that designation entails. The park is mainly rain forests and steep mountains punctuated with a few expansive valleys where some of the Lord of the Rings movies have been shot. The park and its roads are so beautiful that despite beautiful venues in Europe many German automakers like BMW and Audi send left-hand drive cars here for producing ads.

It takes four hours driving each way to reach Milford Sound. On the way we stopped for an hour while our excellent driver/guide grilled some lamb and chicken kabobs and sausages for the 14 passengers. a very long days on total - 13 hours.

The Milford area of the park averages 21 ft of rain a year although in 2016 it received 33 ft!! This amount of rain falling on the steep, stony mountains produces numerous waterfalls that lace the mountain walls.

Milford Sound, while not the largest fjord in the park, is arguably the most beautiful. It is 10 miles long and empties into the Tasman Sea. It has only two permanent waterfalls, but depending on rain amounts, numerous falls of varying size can appear and disappear in hours lacing the mountain walls like icing on a bundt cake. The Milford area had received 10-15 inches of rain in the previous 24 hours so the show was on. In addition to breathtaking vistas during our sound cruise, we got to see up close NZ fur seals and Fjordland crested penguins. A delight.