New Zealand · Oceania · southern hemisphere
Fiordland & Milford Sound is at its best for lakes & coastline in December to February. Good but not prime in March and November. Crowds peak in February and bottom out in July.
| J | F | M | A | M | J | J | A | S | O | N | D | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lakes & Coastline | 86 | 96 | 69 | 47 | 16 | 15 | 13 | 13 | 15 | 37 | 65 | 84 |
| Hiking | 65 | 71 | 90 | 90 | 13 | 10 | 8 | 9 | 12 | 21 | 67 | 63 |
| Wildlife | 67 | 67 | 90 | 90 | 15 | 15 | 15 | 15 | 15 | 15 | 67 | 67 |
| Crowds |
Swipe the table sideways for the rest of the year.
Rain is the point, not the problem — Fiordland takes up to 9,000mm a year, and the waterfalls need it
Day walks from the road, or the multi-day Milford and Routeburn tracks, booked and hut-based. No guide needed.
The Milford road between 11am and 1pm, when the tour coaches own it — and assuming Great Walk huts will have space if you have not booked.
December–February, and 9am–3pm on the Milford road every day of the season
Sandflies, and a two-hour drive each way to Milford — though there are stops worth making: Mirror Lakes, Knobs Flat, The Chasm. The Great Walks are booked huts and long days.
Te Anau is the base; Milford itself has almost no beds. The road in takes two hours and the tour coaches clog it between 9am and 3pm — drive early or late and the Sound is a different place.
One of the wettest inhabited places on earth. Outside the Great Walks season DOC stops managing avalanche and flood hazard on the tracks.May · Jun · Jul · Aug
Kept out of the score on purpose. Averaging a rare catastrophe into a monthly number would tell you something false; the warning is the honest form.
Three of New Zealand’s ten Great Walks start here, all of them booked. The day walks off the Milford road see a fraction of the traffic.
0 is this destination’s own quietest month and 100 its busiest. The scale never compares one destination to another. Source: Wikipedia — Fiordland National Park
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