From the Road

Here I am in Milford Sound. It's raining, and except for yesterday, it's been drizzling. I am at the end of the road it seems, literally. Once you hit here, all you can do is turn around and go about 2 hours to the next town.
A recap so far:

Wed afternoon, Morgan and I head out from Wellington, take the ferry, and drive to a sand-fly ridden valley in the middle of no-where. We're the only ones at the campground, and our excitement for the trip cannot be shaken by the swarms of vampire-like bugs.

Thurs, we drive through the spectacular Buller Gorge, which is as rough a cut as you can drive through. The walls feel like they're gonna fall on top of you. We continue onto the west coast, stopping in Greymouth, and drive right through Barrytown.
--> sidenote: the crazy, knife making dude in Barrytown sold out. He has signs, websites and we just kept driving, disgusted after being so excited.
We drove down the coast and camped.

Friday, we drove to see Pancake rocks, and the blow holes that didn't blow. We stopped at both Franz Joseph and Fox glaciers, which were spectacular, and one of the highlights of my time in NZ. Massive blocks of ice is all they are, yet it's really cool. Then to a rocking Friday night in Haast, which included a shower, breaking a frisbee, and shutting down TWO bars. The only 2 bars, and we were in bed by midnight. It was a place of about 400 people.....

The drive to Queenstown was super scenic, and as we rose over the pass, we saw waterfalls, the Blue Pools, which are exactly what you imagine, except bluer. Then some large lakes, as big as Lake Washington at least, and the nice Wanaka. The sun was out and it was warm. Summer weather indeed. From Wanaka to Queenstown, it's a lot of orchards and vines. We stopped for some just picked cherries and they didn't disappoint. But Queenstown did.
Every backpacker says, "QT is awesome, it's so much fun." It was crap-tacular. A tourist trap with no good bars, and the rain returned. There was a national rugby sevens tourney, which was free to watch, and we did a bit. But we coped with the lack of character by drinking the whiskey Hanukkah Harry bought us for X-Mas and playing cribbage.
We left QT this morn late and were glad to leave. Once again the drive was highly scenic. This place is great. The road to Milford Sound is intensely narrow and curvey, and there are more waterfalls, and kia birds. They're the ones that try to pull stuff off your car, and were going for my windshield wipers. Then through the 1.5 km tunnel to the sound, and we're here.

we're probably gonna stick around here for most of the day tomorrow, and ultimately head to the far south/Invercargill.

I hope everyone has a good time doing what have you.
Aaron