 Maori
frequently travelled this route during journeys to Milford
Sound/Piopiotahi to collect pounamu (greenstone). In 1888
a track was cut up the Arthur Valley to the Sutherland Falls,
with the first known European crossing of the pass made later
that year. Today approximately 14,000 people walk the Milford
track each year making it one of the most popular walks in
New Zealand.
Donald Sutherland and John Mackay found Mackay and Sutherland
Falls in 1880, and possibly also crossed Mackinnon Pass before
pioneer explorer and surveyor Quintin Mackinnon.
In 1888 Sutherland and others were commissioned to cut a
track up the Arthur Valley as far as Sutherland Falls, while
Mackinnon was employed to cut a track up the Clinton Valley
from the head of Lake Te Anau.
On October 17, 1888 Mackinnon and his companion Ernest Mitchell
reached the head of the Clinton Valley, crossed the pass and
continued down the Arthur Valley on the track cut by Sutherland.
Mackinnon was the first Milford Track guide and was long
remembered for his good nature and ability at cooking pompolonas,
a type of scone from which one of the guided trip huts takes
its name.
He ferried parties in his sailing boat Juliet to the head
of Lake Te Anau, then up over the pass to Lake Ada where another
boat ferried them to Sutherland’s accommodation house
at Milford Sound.
The title “the finest walk in the world” first
accompanied an article by poet Blanche Baughan which was published
in the London Spectator in 1908.
In the early days pack horses were used to carry stores to
the huts. Beyond Pompolona Hut a cleared area is an old horse
paddock and stables site. Old number eight wire and insulators
visible along parts of the track are the remains of a telephone
system which linked huts before radio communication was introduced.
Trampers had to walk back along the track from Milford Sound
until 1954 when the Te Anau-Milford Sound highway opened.
Over 14,000 independent and guided trampers now walk the track
each year.
HOME
| HISTORY | LOCATION
| GALLERY| LINKS
 |
| Is Milford Sound Haunted?
The story goes that Sutherland, while happy to settle
at Milford Sound, was also quite lonely. So he sought
out and married a woman happy to live at the sound with
him. However, when he showed her his meagre hut she
refused to live there. Instead they built an 18 room
house that they let out to guests visiting the sound,
the house is long gone but the modern ferry terminal
is located on the same spot.
Upon his death, Sutherland had request to be buried
underneath one of the waterfalls on the sound. His body
was interred there, and a few years later when Elizabeth,
his wife, died she too was buried underneath the falls.
However, a while later a massive storm caused the waterfall
to swell and unearthed both the occupants, sending their
bodies deep into the unexplored waters of the sound!
To this day, if you choose to kayak over Milford Sound,
you might be paddling over the bodies of Sutherland
and his loving wife, Elizabeth! |
|
