The North and South Islands of New Zealand are almst like different countries
This is a trip to South Island in February (late summer) with "Evergreen" .

It was mainly a scenic tour, but I did see some wildlife, including Hector's Dolphin, which only occurs in New Zealand waters.

Mount Cook was unusually clear, although I did manage to miss most of the Keas, I only saw one in flight, too quick to photograph.

The Remarkables in Queenstown and the arching trees in Arrowtown featured in Lord of the Rings.

The most underwhelming part was the Tranz Alpine train journey to Arthur's Pass. Perhaps it is more scenic at other times of the year (?).

The weather was unusually sunny, although still plenty of clouds, as you can see. The day at Milford Sound was the exception...It rained and rained. However, that enhanced the waterfalls and gave a very atmospheric misty feel to my pix.

All pix were taken using a Fujifilm Finepix s8000fd, which has an x18 optical zoom.

click to link to the Ealing and Hampshire House PhotoSoc. All images are © Robbie Hildred 2008