Barrytown to Milford Sound – When Your Best Friend Controls the Weather

Faith is not a one-sided pursuit. While we are often called to strike out alone, faith is not a solitary endeavor. Often, it is easy to get occupied in the struggles of overcoming fear, embarrassment, or one’s own shortcomings and forget we walk in pursuit of the most powerful person in the universe.

In fact, the reward of such a pursuit lies not in the adventure we embark on, but in having His attention. This story is one of many in my life, where I would be reminded, that not only did I not walk alone, but my companion controls the weather…and He is faithful

…But I have called you friends… John 15:15 KJV

Staring out the window of my hop-on-hop-off bus, I took in breathtaking landscape after another and we drove further south as I anxiously awaited my most anticipated destination, Milford Sound. However, before we did so we had a two nights’ stop at the base of the Franz Josef glacier.

Numerous busses converged pouring into a plethora of very well-kept hostels. Crowds of travelers unloaded in this city to, as I like to say, pay lots of money to jump off of stuff. New Zealand is renowned for the bungee jump which makes jumping off of bridges to a common past time in En Zed. I never felt that jumping off of bridges was a good idea.

Besides if I was going to do something extreme, I take an all or nothing approach. Like skydiving, it can only end one of two ways either very successful or I will not be writing to tell you about it, none of this getting whipped around like a rag doll at the end of a really big rubber band. Needless, to say I got my view of the heights of Queenstown going hiking in the beautiful mountains that encapsulated lake Wakatipu where Queenstown sat.

However, the most important thing to me about Queenstown was that it was the closest civilized place from which to reach Milford Sound. While other travelers went looking for places to spend their money, I headed directly for the ticket office for the sounds. Opening the storefront door, I tried to contain my excitement as my eye scanned all the travel brochures and pictures till finally landing upon a strategically placed whiteboard.

“Weather In Fiordland” the sign read. “Tues, Wed, Thurs, Fri, Sat” Each day of the week written in its own row each followed by a hand drawn cloud colored in gray. Of course, there was the occasional cloud with blue droplets falling from it. My heart sunk in despair. What good would taking such a trip if all I was going to see was gray clouds?

Stepping up to the counter the agents did not come off as enthusiastic.

“Hi,” I greeted.

“Hi,” One agent responded.

“I’m thinking about going to Milford Sound.” I shyly stated. “Could I get some information on prices and such?” As the agent went over the options, it was clear this trip was going to be over a hundred dollars.

“Do you know what the weather forecast is supposed to be?” I inquired, as though I did not already know.

“Um yah, rain.” She said pointing to the whiteboard. “That’s Fiordland, it is rain with a chance of rain all week.” 

I inquired about free internet, not that I needed it, I just wanted an escape to think. Money was so tight, I’d only get one shot, and with that weather. Ugh, I knew that my bus route would return to Queenstown later that week, but rain was promised then too. It felt like I was back in Taumarunui trying to decide if I was going to get in that kayak. Then I remembered, I have a God who controls the weather. It did not mean that He would intervene for such a small request, but He could if He chose to. This time I chose to pray for favor.

“Can I still book a trip to Milford Sound?” I asked returning to the counter.

“Sure.” She started taking my information. As I handed her my card, with that hard-earned and quickly dwindling money to be taken from it, I felt more as though I was taking yet another risky step of faith than a vacation.

When I finally joined the bus for my Milford Sound tour, it was pouring rain. Clouds engulfed the city. I took a deep breath, decided to make the best of it, and, well, trust.  

“Alright mates,” my driver broke my thought, “Lovely weather, ay? We’re going to see Milford Sound!” His voice rung with sarcastic enthusiasm. The bus gave a half-hearted cheer. “Come on now, traveling it’s all about the adventure, let’s not let a little bet of rain stop that, ay. It’s always raining in Milford, they get up to seeven meters of rain a year. Nothing to be shook up about. Now who’s ready to see Milford Sound?” A much louder now half sarcastic cheer responded. “Golden! Now, the road we are about to travel is a very, very dangerous road. Fiordland is one of the wettest places on earth, but even more so it is known for extremely dangerous avalanches. No worries, ay, we haven’t lost anyone on this bus yet.

See when Mr. Cook first found Milford Sound he named wrong, because a sound is created by water eerosion, these fiords were carved by glaciers, ay. You can tell because there is a pile of minerals where the fiord meets the sea thet the glaciers left behind. This makes the fiords even more dangerous. In fact, Fiordland is so dangerous that even the Māori were not able to live here much. So, with it being that dangerous, does anyone know why the New Zealand government would build a road in it?”

He paused his lecture waiting for guesses. “Gold! These fiords are full of minerals. In fact, our Prime Minister, Mr. Key, is talking about mining the mountains still today. So, all these people came rushing in here looking for gold; however, it was hard to transport the gold out. Everyone figured that building a road was impossible. That was until this guy named Homer came along. He was as tough as nails and moved out to the sound. There he discovered that the only thing thet was stopping the road was one mountain ridge which is now called the Homer saddle.  But no one did anything about it. That was till the great depression and there were all these guys out of work, so the En Zed government said ‘Ay, let’s build a road.’ So, they drilled the Homer tunnel which we are about to go through. Alright mates.” He paused, silence was the response. “Golden.”

The fog let up slightly, revealing the base of the larger-than-life mountains covered in a brown haze. Rain or not, it was beautiful. The bus pulled over to the side of the road just before the entrance of the Homer tunnel.

“Ay, mates we need to wait our turn. So, you cen get out and take sum pictures if you’d like.” The driver informed us. The pouring rained turned to a light sprinkle. The clouds had lifted high enough to see most of the mountains under a pure gray sky. In 60 some degree Fahrenheit weather, I observed a pile of snow that sat at the mountain’s base. Proof the driver was telling the truth about avalanches.

Back aboard the bus we drove through just over one kilometer of solid rock. I relished the moment of the tunnel only to have the driver pull over once again only moments after we exited it.

“Welcome mates, to what is known to the Māori as the Valley of a Thousand Waterfalls.” The driver announced opening the door. Stepping out of the bus the panoramic was epic. It was like being in the dead center of an ancient stone amphitheater. Thousands of skinny little cascading waterfalls came rushing down the intimidating dark mountainous walls creating an amazing sound. The gray clouds lightened enough to see all around us while still imposing a dramatic effect.

“See, mates the rain was not bad after all. These waterfalls only take moments to dry up. It is very rare to get to see it this active.” The driver informed us.

My daze was distracted by a glimpse of green on the side of the road. There perched on the road-side rail was an about 18-inch-tall Kea, New Zealand’s mountain parrot. It did not flinch allowing us to get within feet of it.

How long we stood there in astonishment, was beyond me, but it did not seem long enough. The bus rolled on to Milford Sound. Zigzagging around each mountain angle it seemed the clouds got higher and higher till we arrived in the car park. At which moment, with no exaggeration, the clouds split the sky, the rain instantly stopped, and the sun burst forth. This is the part where I’d write unbelievable, but at this point in the journey, I did not dare.

We boarded a simple little cruise ship and took off into the sound. The sun burst crashing beams of light through my camera lens. To the right was a gushing waterfall, biggest I have seen to date. Others glistened in the light of the sun raging with life. As the ship rounded the first bend, I just about broke the word unbelievable, there crashing through two waterfalls was an amazing rainbow. The ship’s tour guide pointed out to us the visible fault line as we passed it in. That totally tickled my love for science.

It was a ride of pure bliss as the boat made its way out to the turbulent sea. From there we could see the clouds that only a short time earlier had retreated. As the boat turned around to re-enter the inlet, the clouds began to follow. For the remainder of the trip, to my front was sun, to my back the impending darkness rolled in.

“These waterfalls are just unbelievable.” A gentleman stated standing on the balcony next to me.

“They are something else.” I responded.