Milford Sound Underwater Observatory - Southern Discoveries

Negative experience: This place does not exist anymore and heard from one of the staff that it sunk during a storm early in 2024. Went to the area to check out this unique place but were disappointed as the website did not indicate closure.

Positive experience: The cruise itself is amazing. The Underwater Observatory was interesting, but if you're pressed for time I wouldn't call it essential.

Fantastic experience: Great tour and nice kayak trip Saw some seals and dolfins

Fantastic experience: Only an extra $20 from the cruise ticket. It adds an additional hour to the tour but this is good value if you love science. The instructor is very informative and passionate about the area. Very engaging with the audience

Fantastic experience: Good stop on the cruise with amazing views and information!

Positive experience: Cool concept but do not expect to see huge variety of fish -- it's an observatory and the wildlife might not want to swim up near the window.

Fantastic experience: Grate experience! Friendly and skilled staff, well trained to provide biological knowledge about the nature system there.

Positive experience: Worth the extra time to see. Amazing the amount of sea life that you wouldn't know is in the sound.

Fantastic experience: It really is worth booking with the boat company that offers the underwater observatory as part of their cruise. Make sure you do read what company you book with as only ONE company is permitted to stop and let you explore this really unique experience. It’s called “Southern Discoveries” So much information to read and really amazing to see the conditions that allows this deep sea coral to grow so close to the waters surface. The whole complex of buildings are floating and connected to the mainland with some very cool engineering too, worth seeing from the back walkway

Negative experience: Underwater discovery is a total waste of time and money, there are few staffs that are mucking around and don’t even clean the place. There are so many flies and they bite you constantly as long as you are there. They don’t even bother to use insect spray or clean the place.

Fantastic experience: We did Milford Sound cruise tour and they dropped off us at underwater observation. I didn’t even know this place was included on our tour. But I really enjoyed the experience here. The tour guide was very knowledgeable and friendly. Highly recommend this place.

Positive experience: Not particularly interesting. This was part of a package from Southern Discovery Cruises and it was not worth the time. The most interesting part is the under water observatory building. However, it was packed with tourists, The tour guide was quite monotonous and there was not a huge variety of specimens to observe. Overall, won't recommend it.

Fantastic experience: Very special place. You can arrive only if you cruise the Milford sound with Southern Discoveries.

Positive experience: The sound was beautiful but tbe underwater lookout was a bit underwhelming.

Fantastic experience: Very informative about deep water emergence. Really enjoyed the observatory

Negative experience: If you could give 0 starts I would. Avoid the potential stress and hassle and book with another company. Refusing to refund passengers for things that isn’t in our control and their issues, even after on board being told we are entitled to a refund is poor and illegal.

Positive experience: Quite small and cold but got to see all sorts, including black coral. What you see depends on the day.

Positive experience: Very nice place although I do not advise driving to and from Queenstown in the same day

Positive experience: Pretty cool. Lots of information to read. Take note: It's not an aquarium, it's an observatory so what you see depends on the day, there's no guarantee.

Fantastic experience: It was included in our 3 hours boat trip . However, if I had to pay separately to visit the site I would not do it . The boat trip was exceptional

Positive experience: Small but well created/ maintained floating observatory 10 meters below the lake. We got an opportunity to see various types of fishes, corals etc. The guide was amazing as well informing us about the rich flora and fauna quite unique to milford and how it is preserved. It's worth a visit if you are visiting milford sound.

Fantastic experience: Agreed observatory with lots to see including the black coral and a variety of fish, sea cucumber, starfish, Lots of information about the area, fish, coral and platform at the centre.

Positive experience: Slightly underwhelming, and they let too many people in at once

Positive experience: Reasonably worthwhile extension to the Milford Sound cruise. Descend 60 steps to view the underwater world and see fish, black coral and that's about it. However, the guy gave a really interesting talk about the geology and glacial process, plus facts about local wildlife.

Positive experience: Great stopp off on a Milford sound tour. Glass is quite thick and magnified. Expected to be able to see more but was very cloudy.

Fantastic experience: Definitely worth going with Southern Discoveries to visit the underwater observatory. So cool. Tour guides shared heaps of interesting info.

Fantastic experience: The underwater observatory can only be visited as part of a Southern Discoveries cruise as it is only accessible by boat. The best part of the tour is descending a spiral staircase to a set of windows 10 meters below the surface and viewing fish and plant life. We had a very knowledgeable guide who identified everything we could see and provided lots of interesting details. We spent about 25 minutes doing this before going back upstairs and reading information boards while the other half of the group viewed fish. Most of the group reboarded the boat and returned to the ferry terminal. The total time spent at the observatory was about an hour. We booked the additional option of kayaking. We were provided a waterproof jacket, waterproof trousers, a baseball cap and a bouyancy aid. We each had a plastic box where we left anything we didn't want to take with us. There was a small area with a curtain that could be pulled around anyone wishing to change their clothing in privacy. You can choose single or double kayaks when you book and almost everyone in our group chose double. This is a good choice for younger kids. Many people went barefoot so their shoes didn't get wet. We got into the kayaks on a lift that lowered us into the water. We kayaked around Harrison Cove and a short distance up Harrison River. We saw rare blue ducks on the river but not many other birds or fish. It had begun raining a couple of hours before and many waterfalls appeared compared to our outbound journey on the boat. We had a couple of guides who pointed out things of interest and answered questions. We didn't go very far because of spending a lot of time with the blue ducks and because some members of the group were inexperienced kayakers. Yellow Crested Penguins can be seen at some times of the year, but not when we went. The waterproof clothing doesn't keep you completely dry, but towels were provided to dry off and people who brought a change of clothes could change into them. We spent about 10 minutes hanging out before another boat arrived to drop off the next group of kayakers and return our group to the ferry terminal. Overall we had a fantastic time. The observatory was the highlight for me.

Fantastic experience: It was a privilege to visit the underwater observatory. I loved it.

Fantastic experience: Definitely do this tour with the under water experience, it's fantastic and so informative.

Fantastic experience: Great day out. The cruise and underwater experience exceeded our expectations. Highly recommended. Thanks Team

Fantastic experience: Black coral is white. Very Informative, interesting and educational.

Fantastic experience: The tour including the observatory is close to 3 hours. I thought it was worth it if you got time, you don't get to experience building like this every day. And I learned a lot on top of the cruise!

Fantastic experience: Absolutely amazing. Best experience. Boat tour was awesome, great value, excellent staff. Went on lady Bowen boat had Dan as the captain who was so informative. Wiko, Chris, Julie as staff. Brilliant. Very personal and friendly with the people on board made the Milford sounds experience even better. Loved it. Definitely will do again one day with this company.

Fantastic experience: This was such a buzz, never experienced anything like this before and probably never will again. It’s a definite thumbs up for me

Fantastic experience: The underwater observatory is a very unique experience. It is exclusive to the Southern discoveries cruises. The walkway stairs down to the underwater sea is a majestic way to understand the local ecosystem. The tour guides are very nice and knowledgeable. A whole lot of trivia about how it was constructed, and related ecosystem facts are displayed in the observatory. We visited Milford Sound in December 2020 and luckily visited there when it hadn't rained in almost 3 past days. That made the water very clear to see the marine life undisturbed. It is a must do and highly recommended experience.

Positive experience: Great. Amazing to be 10 meters under water. Our guide here was very informative and funny

Positive experience: Well worth a visit if you are visiting the area. Lots of natural and local history with good guides and information.

Fantastic experience: Amazing place, staff very knowledgeable. To see fish in their natural environment was lovely.

Positive experience: A must see. Plenty of information boards and as we were there on a clear day lots of fish to see. Would have liked longer in the viewing area. The time went very quickly. Spent more time in the waiting area.

Positive experience: It was good to see plenty of fish to look at

Fantastic experience: Very informative and nice to see the Milford Sound from below water.

Fantastic experience: What a great experience. Awesome to see under the fiord after seeing the amazing scenery above water. Beautiful Milford Sound.

Positive experience: We found the observatory quite average and not worth the money.

Fantastic experience: Milford sound was great and the weather was perfect. We saw 3 penguins, had a great coach ride there and a fabulous plane flight back to our hotel in Queenstown

Fantastic experience: One of the best scenic areas in south island of New Zealand. If you are visiting new Zealand for a short while make sure you go for a cruise ride in Milford sound. The weather is mostly wet throughout the year which leads to the road closures because of high chance of avalanche. Therefore plan a couple of days for Milford sound to cater for this. You will definitely enjoy the area and get to see some wildlife on the cruise like seals and if you are lucky, penguins and dolphins. Have a great trip!

Fantastic experience: Good experience but alot of your viewing might depend on luck and when the fishes come. Please note it is not an aquarium, it is an oberservatory so don't expect to see sharks or massive marine life

Positive experience: It is good experience to see the observatory under water in the middle of nowhere. Tour guides are lovely and knowledgable.

Fantastic experience: An amazing place to dive deep without going too deep. The black corals that are normally 100s of metres deep are only 10m deep. The unique marine life is unbelievable and in its natural environment instead of a marine. The history too of the Milford sounds is worth reading and mind blowing.

Positive experience: Its ok, nothing extraordinary, if you have the time to do it is a good activity else I would not spend my time, far better things to do in Milford.

Fantastic experience: Fantastic experience. The scenery was superb. Big shout out to Simon in the Underwater Observation Centre - absolute wealth of information.

Fantastic experience: Amazing view and suggest to buy a raincoat because there were rainning 3/2 year...

Fantastic experience: Well worth the extra time (about an hour) and money $12 extra to include this on top of the standard tour.

Fantastic experience: A Must go spot. And the underwater view point is nice as well.

Fantastic experience: My husband and I went to Milford Discovery Centre & Underwater Observatory as part of an overnight cruise on Milford Sound, stopping there for 45 minutes in the morning after the cruise. This wasn't really long enough as there was lots of information in the centre we didn't get to read - if you are able to go for longer I would recommend it (though we did have the advantage of being in a small group - apparently it gets very busy at other times). The underwater observatory was fascinating - you get to see creatures like sea cucumbers and black coral (which looks like a beautiful underwater tree) that would usually be too deep for humans to observe but are at a shallower depth in Milford Sound due to the particular conditions here. We were given a commentary and guided tour of the observatory by Aske, who was very friendly and extremely knowledgeable especially considering he hadn't been working there that long. He answered lots of questions about things we saw in the observatory in great detail.

Positive experience: Nice Discovery centre with a lot of information about Milford sound.

Positive experience: Visited New Zealand's only floating underwater observatory, which is accessible only by boat. This visit was added to the Southern Discoveriss cruise to learn about the story of Milford Sound and the conservation efforts. At the obsevatory, there were entertaining videos and easy-to-read information panels. This was coupled with a guide telling us more about the unique history, geology and wildlife of Milford Sound. To observe the deep water emergence, we descended a spiral staircase (60 steps) to 10 metres beneath the water surface, and get to see rare black coral (white in colour but named so due to its black skeleton when first discovered) and meet colourful sea creatures. Overall, a good place to spend 45 minutes to an hour while cruising to get a truly immersive experience to discover Milford Sound above and below the surface.

Fantastic experience: Excellent services and tour guide knowledgeable of the Discovery Centre.

Fantastic experience: Wonderful underwater views of a real marine habitat, hospitality and knolwedge of guides second to none, and breathtaking views of the cliffs on opposite side of the fiord.

Positive experience: Great cruise and underwater observatory. We managed to see some dolphins on the cruise which was a bonus. The boat itself was nice, was not crowded as we were on the last cruise of the day, has ample seating inside, but only a number of seats outside on the boat we were on. We got complimentary tea and coffee. We also went for the observatory and lunch option, although we weren’t told we had to get our lunch on the boat before we got the observatory which was a bit annoying, however the staff organised for our lunch to be waiting for us back at the start. The observatory was pretty cool, you walk down a spiral staircase to a level underwater with windows all around. Loads of fish and black coral to look at which was nice. We were told that the tour before managed to spot the dolphins! For the cruise, observatory and lunch we paid €80 each which wasn’t too bad. There is plenty of parking there if you choose to drive (and I would recommend this as there are some nice sights to see on the way).

Fantastic experience: Awesome experience and see marine life in their natural habitat.

Fantastic experience: Guided tour was very informative and well executed. Just the right level of information and interesting facts. The view can be different based on the weather and rainfall - we were lucky!

Negative experience: This is the best example of how they can market a substandard stuff like this as an exotic experience. What a big let down ! Especially after seeing lot of value for money activities like glacier heli ride, skydiving, bungy jumping, scenic flights, the authorities should take a note and stop charging for the underwater observatory if you really wanna promote awareness about marine underwater life. Priced at 36 NZD, you come out with a feeling of having been fleeced.

Positive experience: Great place to hop a cruise around Milford Sound, nice lounges inside. Limited food available so be sure to grab a bite before you arrive. We went with the Go Orange tour boat and got lunch on board which was quite nice, the price was fantastic and the staff were very friendly! Would highly recommend this operator. There is plenty of free parking available onsite.

Negative experience: Not recomended if you have ever been to any underwater observatory! (And probably even if you haven't). They say there are deep water creatures because less light penetrate the fresh/salt water layers. In my opinion it looks just as lit as it should be at 10 meters. All the creatures seem to be the usual shallow water creatures except for the black coral and it's snake star. But the coral is planted into the observatory walls and no bedrock coral is seen. We went to the observatory after 13:35 Mitre Peak cruise. It seemed that the observatory was about to close so we had a limited time there and left with all the crew on their boat. Tickets are 36$ per person.