Bowen Falls in Fiordland National Park 15

The Bowen Falls (), also known as Lady Bowen Falls, is a popular tourist attraction at

Milford Sound Milford Sound (, officially gazetted as Milford Sound / Piopiotahi) is a fiord in the south west of New Zealand's South Island within Fiordland National Park, Piopiotahi (Milford Sound) Marine Reserve, and the Te Wahipounamu World Heritage ...

, a

fiord In physical geography, a fjord (also spelled fiord in New Zealand English; ) is a long, narrow sea inlet with steep sides or cliffs, created by a glacier. Fjords exist on the coasts of Antarctica, the Arctic, and surrounding landmasses of the no ...

in New Zealand. The long Bowen River located in

Fiordland National Park Fiordland National Park is a national park in the south-west corner of South Island of New Zealand. It is the largest of the 13 National parks of New Zealand, national parks in New Zealand, with an area covering , and a major part of the Te W� ...

supplies the waterfall with water; the Bowen River is also used to generate electricity and supply drinking water to the nearby locality also named

. Bowen Falls is one of just two permanent waterfalls that discharge into the fiord, and, at , it is the tallest. The river and waterfalls were named for

Diamantina Bowen Diamantina, Lady Bowen (; 1832/1833–1893), was a noble from the formerly Venetian Ionian Islands who became the wife of Sir George Bowen, the first Governor of Queensland. Personal life The '' Contessa'' Diamantina di Roma was born in 183 ...

(Lady Bowen), the wife of the fifth

governor of New Zealand A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of a state's official representative. Depending on the type of political region or polity, a ''governor'' ma ...

George Bowen Sir George Ferguson Bowen ( zh, 寶雲; 2 November 1821 – 21 February 1899), was an Anglo-Irish author and colonial administrator whose appointments included postings to the Ionian Islands, Queensland, New Zealand, Victoria, Mauritius and H ...

. The governor visited Milford Sound aboard in 1871 and Bowen Falls was named to mark the occasion. The track from the Milford Sound wharf to Bowen Falls closed in 2002 after a rock face had become unstable. The waterfall was inaccessible for 15 years and could only be visited by boat. On 29 January 2018, a short on-demand boat service ( long) was initiated that overcomes the unstable section. The round trip from Milford Sound wharf to Bowen Falls takes half an hour including the two boat trips.

References

Waterfalls of Fiordland Tourist attractions in the Southland Region Fiordland National Park {{Waterfall-stub

See also

References