Thursday December 19, 2024 – Wednesday December 25, 2024
(This is part 1 of our 2.5 week Milford Track & Australia trip — for part 2, check out http://exploringduo.com/australia/!)
Milford Track is a 5 day 4 night 33.5 mile hiking excursion, although the only real hiking was done in the middle 3 days. First and last days were transportation to/from the hike, including boat rides! We did this trek via a guided tour with Ultimate Hikes, which provided transportation, guides, and very luxurious food and lodging for being in the middle of nowhere: rooms with awesome views, showers, electricity, a drying room, even bar service… we thought the tour was good value.
Scenery-wise, most of the hike is through lush green vegetation, very Jurassic-Park-like. Especially the first and last days of hiking; those were the flat days too. The middle day was an uphill climb over a pass, then an even more downhill climb. And weather-wise, we were lucky; this place rains most of the year but it only lightly rained one of the days for us. But let’s get into the details and break it down day by day…
New Zealand – Day 0
We landed in New Zealand the day before starting the Milford Track. Stayed at the Dairy Private Hotel and it was so cute of a boutique hotel, the closest stay we’ve had to that B&B vibe that I had been chasing. Like there was a carafe of fresh milk from local dairy farmers in our fridge, how cool is that? We had dinner and meat pies but not much time to explore Queenstown since resting that night was important. The next morning we would begin Milford Track.
Milford Track – Days 1-5
Day 1 we met at their office in Queenstown. We rode a bus, had a lunch stop, continued the bus ride, took a 1 hr ferry ride, then hiked a mile to our first lodging of the trip, the historic Glade House. Sadly, at literally the beginning of the hike when we took a picture with the trail sign, Victor sprained an ankle on a tree trunk. So after reaching the lodge, some of us went on the nature walk tour to learn about plants but he stayed back. On day 1 we began our nightly ritual of playing Tichu; losing team had to carry the cards, and we never had to carry the cards 🙂
Day 2 was 10 miles of flat trail through the lush Beech Forest. We followed the Clinton River all day, with the variations in the day being a pretty wetlands boardwalk to learn about moss, a lunch stop at a hut, the latter part of the walk opening up to grander valley views, Prairie Lake with a waterfall that some of our tour group went in but not us because the water was freezing cold, and we saw lots of birds from Wekas to Bush Robins. We stayed the night at Pompolona Lodge. Shower, wash clothes, dinner, briefing, packing, Tichu, then early bedtime for an early rise— this was our daily after-hike schedule.
Day 3 was the hardest. Though it was only 9 miles today, all our incline and decline was condensed into this one day. Lots of up, even more down. The goal of the day was to climb up McKinnon Pass, soak in the views at the top where the McKinnon Memorial is, then climb down the other side to stay the night at Quinton Lodge. We were lucky with the weather at the top. It’s cold and often cloudy but when we reached it, it briefly cleared up to present us with a view. The descent down was steep and rocky, and it lightly rained the whole way down making the rocks even more slippery. After reaching the lodge, we took an optional side quest to Sutherland Falls. It was 45 min there and then the same back, but seeing the tallest waterfall in New Zealand was worth it, how grand a waterfall and view. This was also the lodge where they set up a play area for the Kea birds, playful naughty birds that are as smart as a 4 year old toddler, we got to see them the next morning.
Day 4 was a super long 13.5 mile hike to get to the finish line. It was all flat but the same monotonous journey almost throughout. Most of it was in dense forest so it’s hard to see much else. Highlights today were Mackay Falls, an interesting and pretty one, and Giants Gate where we had second lunch by yet another pretty waterfall. Today we had to put in conscious effort to converse about anything and everything to help pass the time haha. Finally, reaching Sandfly Point meant we finished Milford Track! We then got shuttled in a little boat to Mitre Peak Lodge. On this last night, we had the luxury to stay at a lodge that was less remote meaning the generator didn’t shut off at 10pm and the sandflies didn’t swarm us like crazy and there were even laundry machines. Feels great being back in civilization. And the view from our room of Milford Sound was just so premium! Dinner was lamb chops, very celebratory to end the hike, with the coincidence of it being on Christmas Eve too.
Day 5 was no walking yay! Great Christmas present. We took a cruise on the beautiful Milford Sound, seeing rocky cliffs, wispy waterfalls and a pod of dolphins. The captain said it was unusual to see dolphins and it was the first time they showed up this year, but it’s already the 25th of Dec so… really? lol, sketch. We took a four hour long bus ride back to Queenstown, very scenic although I had a hard time staying awake. Got dinner then went to the airport to take our first leg of the trip to Tasmania, which was a flight to Melbourne with an overnight layover. Lots of transiting on Christmas Day…
In summary, the scenery of Milford Trek was lovely, perhaps not quite up to my lofty expectations given how much I’ve heard of New Zealand, but still it had its moments. We think the best part of this trek was that we’ve never hiked with such a luxurious experience, from lodge to comfy lodge and such nice meals every night. Plus it’s not overly strenuous for a multi-day hike, so many families and folks of varying ages were on this tour with us. How many multi-day hikes are this accessible? With this hike down, we continued on to the Australia part of our trip, check it out at http://exploringduo.com/australia/!