Milford Sound Cruises

What’s included and what’s not

Included on every day cruise here

• The cruise itself, 1 hr 45 min to 2 hr 15 min, out to the Tasman Sea and back
• Commentary from the skipper or crew, and on Southern Discoveries and RealNZ boats a commentary app in several languages
• Free tea and coffee. Cruise Milford adds biscuits, Mitre Peak adds hot chocolate
• Toilets on board

Not included unless the listing says so

• Getting to Milford Sound. These are cruise-only tickets; you drive, take a coach or fly
• Parking, charged by the hour at the terminal. Pure Milford and RealNZ include the parking fee; the others don’t
• Food. No meal on the standard cruises, and Cruise Milford sells none on board
• Alcohol, which is sold separately on the boats that have a bar

Where the listings differ, and why it matters

The lunch cruises are the clearest split. RealNZ’s premium cruise serves a canapé lunch over 2.5 hours. The Fiordland Jewel’s lunch cruise has a chef-cooked meal and asks for dietary needs in advance. Southern Discoveries sells a picnic lunch as an add-on to its nature cruise.

On the overnight cruises, dinner, breakfast, a cabin and the kayaks or tender boat are included on both. Drinks are not. The Fiordland Jewel adds a top deck hot tub after dinner. The Mariner has single and twin share en suite cabins. Overnight parking is charged separately on both, per booking.

The day, hour by hour

The cruise is under 2 hours. Getting to it is most of the day, so this runs from the car door to the car door for the common case: a 1pm sailing, driving in from Te Anau.

9:00am. Leave Te Anau with a full tank and food in the car. There’s no fuel or shop on the 2 hour road in, and the Milford pump is small and sometimes dry, according to Luxe Tours, a Te Anau operator.

9:30am to 11:30am. Stops along the Milford Road. Mirror Lakes and the Eglinton Valley are the usual ones. Knobs Flat has the last flushing toilet on the road.

About 11:45am. The Homer Tunnel. It’s one lane with traffic lights, and the waits travellers timed were 7 minutes (Helen and Tim Travel) and 10 minutes (Coleman Murray). Turn your headlights off on the far side. Coleman Murray didn’t, and needed a jump start after the cruise.

12:15pm. Arrive and park. Allow 40 minutes from the last lookout to the boat. In January the operators say up to an hour.

12:30pm. Check in at your operator’s counter in the terminal. Each operator has its own desk and its own deadline, from 15 to 30 minutes before sailing.

1:00pm. Sail. Mitre Peak is the backdrop as you leave, but no traveller we watched described the boat stopping for it; it’s a view you pass. The boats run the length of the fiord, about 15 km, past Bowen Falls and the seal rocks near the entrance, and 5 of the 6 travellers’ boats went out into the Tasman Sea near St Anne’s Lighthouse before turning.

Around 2:00pm. The waterfall. Most skippers nose the bow into Stirling Falls, and anyone on the front deck gets soaked. Coleman Murray’s captain warned people off the bow first. Bring the waterproof up with you.

2:45pm or 3:00pm. Back at the wharf, depending on whether you booked a 1 hour 45 minute or a 2 hour cruise. The walk back to a far car park took Our World Journey half an hour.

3:15pm to 6:00pm. Drive back. Our World Journey took 2.5 to 3 hours to Te Anau with stops. Outside summer, a late sailing means the last part of the road in fading light.

On an overnight cruise

The shape is different. You board mid afternoon, after most day boats have gone. Chloé and sometimes Ludvig boarded at 3:45pm and were off at 9:15am the next day.

• Late afternoon: kayaks or the tender boat go out in a sheltered arm. Chloé’s boat had 20 single kayaks, first come first served, and the paddle was cut short because more people wanted to go than expected.
• Evening: dinner on board, then a nature talk from the crew. Chloé called the talk one of their favourite parts.
• Night: the boat anchors in the fiord. There’s no phone signal to speak of.
• 7:00am to 7:30am: breakfast, packed away strictly at 7:30 before the boat heads out to the open sea.
• Morning: the run out to the Tasman Sea, which was rough on Chloé’s trip, then back to the wharf mid morning.

Meeting point and getting there

Every day cruise on this page leaves from the same building: the Milford Sound Visitor Terminal at Freshwater Basin, at the end of State Highway 94. The operators each have a desk inside, so the one thing to get right is which desk.

The one exception is the cruise and track walk combination, which starts with a water taxi from Deepwater Basin, a separate wharf about 1 km back up the road.

Parking and the walk in

There are two kinds of parking and the difference is about half an hour on foot.

• Paid car park near the terminal. Charged by the hour, paid by card at the machines. Pay as soon as you park. The NZ Brits said a past visit ended in a fine for not paying, and enforcement is strict. On their visit they ended up in the third, overflow car park.
• Free gravel car park on the left as you come in, at the Deepwater Basin turn. Coleman Murray timed the walk at 25 minutes; Cruise Milford’s listing says 40.

Pure Milford and RealNZ include parking fees on the listings we checked. The others don’t, so expect to pay at the machine.

From Queenstown or Te Anau

Te Anau to Milford is about 2 hours of driving without stops. Queenstown to Milford is about 4. RealNZ’s listing tells people to allow 5 to 6 hours from Queenstown and 3 from Te Anau, which is closer to how the day actually goes once you stop for photos and the tunnel.

If 8 to 9 hours of return driving from Queenstown sounds like too much, a coach day trip with the cruise included takes the wheel off you. Those are compared on our Milford Sound day trips from Queenstown page.

If you’re running late

Call the operator, not the booking site. The operator’s number is on your Viator confirmation. Most of these operators run several sailings a day, so ask whether a later boat has room. Nothing on the listings promises it. Missing a sailing without calling usually counts as a no show. There’s no phone signal for much of the Milford Road, so call from Te Anau if you already know you’ll be late.

What to bring

Dress for the deck, not the car park. Wind on the open deck makes it far colder than the terminal. Our World Journey had about 5°C on deck and couldn’t feel their fingers. Chloé and sometimes Ludvig were underdressed at 8°C at dusk.

• A waterproof jacket, even on a sunny day. The waterfall pass soaks the bow.
• A warm layer and a beanie. Three of the six travellers mentioned the cold.
• Insect repellent. Sandflies came up in three videos, mostly on the shore and the walk in.
• Snacks and water. Cruise Milford’s listing says no food is sold on board. Most boats offer free tea and coffee, and that’s it unless you booked a lunch.
• Cash or card for the bar on the overnight boats. Drinks are extra on both.
• Something for seasickness if you get it, on the overnight cruises in particular. The open sea stretch is where it gets rough.
• Proof of age for children, which Cruise Milford checks at the desk.

Leave the drone in the car. Milford Sound is inside Fiordland National Park, and the Department of Conservation says flying one there without a permit is prohibited.

Coleman Murray and Our World Journey both singled out the free hot drinks on a cold deck. They’re on most of the cruises below.

How to choose

Boat size matters more than anything you can pay extra for. Every day cruise covers the same water in roughly the same time. What changes is how many people share the rail when the boat noses into a waterfall.

What the dearer trips add

A meal, a smaller crowd and, overnight, the quiet. They don’t add more fiord. The lunch cruises are about half an hour longer, and Dane and Stacey lost about 30 minutes of their 2 hours to boarding and eating lunch inside.

The overnight trip is the one where the extra buys something you can’t get by day. Chloé and sometimes Ludvig had the fiord nearly to themselves after the last day boat left, then a paddle and the crew’s nature talk. They also found an empty conditioner bottle, a faulty hair dryer and a choppy run to the sea.

Pick this if

• You want the best chance of getting close: a small boat. Three travellers praised the space and the access, and Adventurous Hearts, who saw it from a big ship, said large boats “can’t get as close as a smaller boat does”.
• You’re driving in on a wet day: Pure Milford’s glass roof keeps the view without the soaking.
• You’ve already done a day cruise: the overnight, or the nature guide sailing.

Skip it if

• You’d rather not spend 8 to 9 hours on the road from Queenstown for 2 hours on the water. A coach day trip takes the driving off you, and a scenic flight does it in half a day. All the ways in are on our Milford Sound tours page.
• You only want the view of Mitre Peak. You can see it from the foreshore for free, and the Milford Sound guide covers the walks there.

Season and timing

The cruises run all year. What changes is the road, the light and how many people you share the terminal with.

Rain is not a reason to cancel

Milford is one of the wettest places in New Zealand, with rain on roughly 180 to 200 days a year depending on whose video you watch. Four sources said rain makes the cruise better, because hundreds of temporary waterfalls appear down the cliffs. Helen and Tim Travel had rain overnight and a clear morning, which they called the best of both. Our World Journey said they had “all four seasons” in one cruise.

The honest catch: low cloud can hide Mitre Peak and the tops entirely. If seeing the peaks matters more to you than the waterfalls, keep a spare day.

Which sailing to book

A late morning or 1pm sailing is the easy middle for drivers from Te Anau. It leaves time for stops on the way in and daylight on the way back. Early sailings mean leaving Te Anau before 7am. Late ones, outside summer, mean the Milford Road after dark.

Coleman Murray booked his day cruise at the last minute, once the forecast was clear. That works for the refundable day cruises, which can be cancelled up to 24 hours ahead. It doesn’t work for the overnight boats, which can’t be refunded and take 22 to 64 guests a night.

FAQ