page_title: South Island
section_title: Fiords
hierarchical_section_title: South Island / Geography / Natural geographic features / Fiords
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Neuseeland: Der Milford Sound, ein 14 km langer Fjord auf der Südinsel, ist Teil des Fiordlands National Parks und gehört mit zum Weltnaturerbe der UNESCO. Der Meeresarm ist umgeben von steil abfallenden Berge mit einer Höhe bis zu 1.6080 Meter NN und von zahlreichen Wasserfällen. Simple English: New Zealand: Milford Sound, a 14 km long fjord on the South Island, is part of the Fiordlands National Park and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The inlet is surrounded by steep mountains with a height of up to 1,680 meters above sea level and numerous waterfalls.
context_page_description: The South Island, also officially named Te Waipounamu, is the larger of the two major islands of New Zealand in surface area, the other being the smaller but more populous North Island. It is bordered to the north by Cook Strait, to the west by the Tasman Sea, and to the south and east by the Pacific Ocean. The South Island covers 150,437 square kilometres, making it the world's 12th-largest island. It has a temperate climate.
  The South Island is shaped by the Southern Alps which run along it from north to south. They include New Zealand's highest peak, Aoraki / Mount Cook at 3,724 metres. The high Kaikoura Ranges lie to the northeast. The east side of the island is home to the Canterbury Plains while the West Coast is famous for its rough coastlines such as Fiordland, a very high proportion of native bush and national parks, and the Fox and Franz Josef Glaciers. The main centres are Nelson, Christchurch, and Dunedin. The economy relies on agriculture and fishing, tourism, and general manufacturing and services.
  As it is 32 percent larger than the North Island, the South Island is sometimes nicknamed the "mainland" of New Zealand.
context_section_description: The South Island has 15 named maritime fiords which are all located in the southwest of the island in a mountainous area known as Fiordland. The spelling 'fiord' is used in New Zealand rather than 'fjord', although all the maritime fiords use the word Sound in their name instead.
  A number of lakes in the Fiordland and Otago regions also fill glacial valleys. Lake Te Anau has three western arms which are fiords (and are named so). Lake McKerrow to the north of Milford Sound is a fiord with a silted-up mouth. Lake Wakatipu fills a large glacial valley, as do lakes Hakapoua, Poteriteri, Monowai and Hauroko in the far south of Fiordland. Lake Manapouri has fiords as its west, north and south arms.
  The Marlborough Sounds, a series of deep indentations in the coastline at the northern tip of the South Island, are in fact rias, drowned river valleys.
caption: Typical view of the Milford Sound
exif: {"Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon EOS 5D", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop Elements 9.0 Macintosh", "Image DateTime": "2019:01:14 20:05:59", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "228", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1054", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "4782", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/400", "EXIF FNumber": "8", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "250", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2009:03:09 12:06:00", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2009:03:09 12:06:00", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "69/8", "EXIF ApertureValue": "6", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "93", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "3600", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2400", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "928", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "633600/283", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "352000/157", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "2", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}