The South Island—Manapouri to Doubtful Sound & Te Anau, February 28-March 1, 2025

Manapouri to Doubtful Sound, February 28, 2025

This part of our trip turned out to be the highlight of our six weeks in New Zealand. If you ever get the chance to go to Doubtful Sound, you must do the overnight excursion! It's remote, beautiful, and I'm not sure my pictures do justice to this part of Fiordland National Park, but I tried. (To book this trip, go to RealNZ.com and do a search for Doubtful Sound Overnight Cruise | Aboard the Navigator

View of Lake Manapouri from B&B porch.

Dining room where we were served breakfast.

Pearl Harbor, you read that right, is Manapouri's harbor.

One of the boats that ferry Doubtful Sound visitors across Lake Manapouri.

Leaving Pearl Harbor.

Paul's Dome on our way to West Arm.

Lake Manapouri was carved by glaciers, but...

...I'm sure you figured it out before I mentioned it.

This underground hydroelectric power plant that empties into Doubtful Sound supplies electricity to 670,000 NZ homes.

Our first view of Doubtful Sound from Wilmot Pass Summit.

The view from our cabin window.

The double bed & private "head" was worth it.

Just check out this weather!

The crew kept gushing about the sunshine.

And you can see we were LUCKY!

The crew continuously crowed about the sunshine.

The skipper welcomed visitors to the bridge.

The Navigator is 126ft/42m long and is 490 tons.

The skipper has videos of the ship and a nav chart, of course.

This is actually the captain of the vessel. He took over on the second day. Today he wove line.

This one waves hello while napping.

We were able to get up close to a fur seal colony.

Kayaking and swimming were options at the end of the day.

The Wanderer is our smaller sister ship.

It's difficult to tell but from sea to mountain top is 3,000ft/914m.

Our second day was cloudy but warm.

See what I mean about the beauty?

 

The captain turned off the engines for 10 minutes so the only sounds we heard while adrift were from Doubtful Sound. We were the only ship in the fjord and it was so quiet we could hear bird song in the distance. If you turn up the sound on the above video, listen for the birds and marvel at the silence.

Luckily, Dave has experience with the Wilmot Pass.

The power plant that provides electricity for 670,000 homes (taken from the West Arm Harbor of Lake Manapouri).

Te Anau's Glowworm Caves,     March 1, 2025

After we disembarked the Navigator in Doubtful Sound and crossed the Wilmot Pass over to Lake Manapouri's West Arm Harbor, we headed to Te Anau for this fascinating excursion. New Zealanders, and others who have visited New Zealand, said visiting the Glowworm Caves was worth it. They were right. It was magical and informative.

Pictures aren't allowed in the caves, but you see some here. (scroll down to see them on the linked website)

Teresa was our personal guide through the caves.

These pests are really "pest-y"!

This orchid is growing on a beech tree.

The above creatures live in the caves or in the "creek" flowing through the limestone caves. Again, be sure to check out the Real NZ Te Anau Glowworm website. Be sure to scroll down to the Images part of the website and click the load more tab so you can see all the pictures I would have taken in the caves if allowed.

 

There's a great story about why they called this the Glowworm Caves, even though technically, these aren't worms; they are actually the larvae of fungus gnats that secrete a sticky vomit to catch sandflies and other prey. Once caught by a string of vomitous pearls from the cave ceiling, the worm injects a digestive liquid into its victim and then sucks out the victims innards. 

 

This is an insect that looks similar to mosquitos, and when it reaches maturity, it becomes a fly. The only other larvae that turn into flies are...maggots. But since folks were sure visitors wouldn't visit vomitous, cannibalistic maggots, they decided on the term glowworm. Since then the Glowworm Caves have been successful.