A Night on the Doubtful Sound

K: An overnight trip on the Doubtful Sound was just great. Most of the tourists head to the Milford Sound in Fiordland, but we selected the more remote, less-trafficked Doubtful.

You travel by boat for one hour across Lake Manapouri, then in a bus through dense rainforest for 40 minutes on the only road in Fiordland, and then board the boat for the trip through the sound/fiord. Despite the rain, the Doubtful is
beautiful with rugged peaks, dense green forest and an endless number of waterfalls.

Its scenery is like Norway meets Indonesia. Deep fiords, surrounded by mountains, but the setting is a rainforest rather than alpine mountains. The fog from the rain made for an almost eerie setting.

Part of the cruise entailed fishing for our dinner. My dad would have been so proud of me baiting my own hook as well as taking the live fish off the hook! Who knew fishing could be so enjoyable, perhaps it was because I didn't have to be quiet!



































V: We cruised the Doubtful Sound on the good ship Tutoko II, captained by Richard, and crewed by Jen. I highly recommend cruising the Doubtful with Fiordland Expeditions, as Captain Richard's commentary as we journeyed was informative and wry, witty, and just plain hilarious.

And Jen, the mate, was simply outstanding. She was a fine cook, and an even better procurer of the food for the guests to eat. She donned her wet suit, put on the scuba tank, and over the side, into the fjord she went, gathering fresh rock lobsters (or crayfish as the Kiwi's call them) with her bare hands from the Sound for one of our dinner courses. Dinner included pumpkin and vegetable soup, fresh steamed lobster, grilled sea perch, rice and fresh vegetables. Breakfast the next day was scrambled eggs with lobster, grilled bacon, sausage and mushrooms. In addition to cooking, catching lobsters, and gutting fish, she cleans the boat, does the dishes and laundry with only two hours free between each of the overnight cruises. In her spare time she fishes and hunts elk and deer. She was impressive, and mature beyond her 20 years.

We guests had great fun fishing from the rear of the vessel. We all caught quite a few Sea Perch, aka Jock Stewarts, due to their Scottish tartanesque striping pattern. It was absolutely wonderful to have our fresh-caught fish as our main course for dinner.

Karen caught a Blue Cod, and we were so excited at the prospect of eating that, but, alas, we had to put it back as it was three centimeters shy of allowable length to be a "keeper". One of our group pulled up a barracuda, and another hooked a dogfish, a member of the shark family, but we threw them both back into the water.

We got to do a little kayaking in the rain, and it was really great to be on a small boat, with only five other guests, a nice intimate setting, as opposed to the Milford Sound boats of 70 guests plus.

The Doubtful Sound is like the fjord country of Norway, with dramatic, breathtaking waterfalls, and steep rockwall descents to the water, yet it is, arguably, more beautiful, due to the green forest cover of those rockwalls, and not the barren cliffs of Norway. And, hey, New Zealand is a whole lot less expensive than Norway, as a bonus!