Just booked New Zealand for our honeymoon....any suggestions on must do's?

buy his and hers Zerodes.

Da Peach said:

buy his and hers Zerodes.

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I think you just launched me into about 30 to 45 mins of un-productive daydreaming with that comment.

Milford Sound is awesome but Doubtful Sound is utterly amazing. I lived in NZ for around a year, most of the time on the South Island and I can confidently recommend spending at least 90% of your time down there.

Spend as much time in Fiordland as possible - seriously, I've never seen anything like it. Also, Queenstown and Wanaka (where I actually lived) are incredible as well. You seriously can't go wrong in that region.

I went back for a couple of months in 2009 and now one of the top things on my bucket list is to hike the Dusky Track:

http://www.doc.govt.nz/parks-and-recreation/tracks-and-walks/fiordland/fiordland/dusky-track/

piihb

kazlx said:

Can you drive in to Doubtful Sound?

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Nope - you drive to the next little town beside Te Anau (the name escapes me), then you hope on a boat and go across Lake Manapori (which is awesome in itself), then tour this huge underground power station and drive over a really scenic pass to a boat on Doubtful Sound.

The Doubtful Sound dolphins were one of the coolest things I've ever seen.

If you have to choose between one or the other, definitely go with Doubtful. Though when I was last there, my wife and I did a day trip from Te Anau to Milford (awesome, scenic drive) and then went to Doubtful the next day. So doing both is very feasible.

I did a 3-day kayak trip on Doubtful and it was simply fantastic. Milford was just crowded with tourists.

Would love to hike Dusky Track to Dusky sound sometime but that is a serious adventure undertaking; you need a boat to pre-cache food and stuff for you. If I could go there again now that I have money, I think a helicopter tour of the Fiordlands would be fantastic. Watch the "Shadowlands" movie in Te Anu even if it seems strange to see the movie when the real things are right there.

I loved Wanaka but Queenstown was pretty "meh." Dunno what I'd done in Wanaka besides mountain biking, though. Fantastic set of trails and I just rode day-in, day-out. I did love the mountain bike trail down the canyon towards the bungee jump bridge in Queenstown; forget the track name. Super flowly rollercoaster-y type stuff.

North Island, I really love Wellington as a city, Tongariro Crossing is not to be missed, and Coromandel Penninsula was nicer beach/coast wise than the stuff north of Auckland IMHO. Hot water beach was cool. The northwest coast of the South Island (punakaiki etc, town of Greymouth) was pretty wild and beautiful too. Hell, even Invercargill is worth a drive through to see the world's coldest sheep, and Dunedin's a beautiful fun town.

I missed seeing the penguins, though.

I recommend touring NZ by campervan. The Dept of Conservation campgrounds just require a dollar or two tossed in a box at the entrance and they're often in superb locations, and commercial campsites aren't very expensive either when you need a little more infrastructure. Public transport is about nil, and it's nice to be on your own schedule vs. some commercial tour bus or other group.


My pics

[Make sure to look lower-right for all the albums--Photobucket sucks, but I put this stuff up years ago.]


Edit: DEFINITELY see a cave with glow-worms. It's rad, especially if you're floating on a barge in the dark underneath them. I went to a cave somewhere near Te Anau for it; short boat trip to get there.

Destroy the ring. Save the world.

mandown said:

piihb

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PIIHobbitB

Make sure you visit the West Island.

Like MikeD mentioned, campervan's are VERY popular there, we rented one with some other monkies and drove around mountain biking the South Island and found it easy to find a place to camp everywhere we went. Abel Tasman sea kayaking was touristy yet fun.

Yeah plenty of bike hire places in Qtown and Christchurch.

Go for the 2 or 3 day paddle in doubtful sound. You can't beat that.

Check out castle hill (just to walk around, but if you're into bouldering it can't be beat). Also, take some flashlights/headlamps and walk up cave stream, which is nearby (exactly what it sounds like). Actually, all of Arthur's pass to Porter's pass can't be beat for scenery. Mt. Avalanche is worth the hike and you'll get to spend some time with some kea.

Go to Mt. Cook/Aoraki and stay at ball hut on the ball glacier for a really nice one night stint. It's quiet there, probably won't see anyone else.

Don't worry too much about the catlins or moeraki boulders.

For a cool natual hot spring experience hike in and stay over at the copland river. Don't go to hanmer springs - tourist trap.

If you want an interesting 5 day hike/kayak, do the inland track at able tasman to awaroa, then walk the coastal track for a few days and arrange before you leave to have kayaks dropped at one of the beaches. Then kayak back to where you started. It's awesome.

Of course, you can't go wrong just showing up and figuring it all out when you get there with 0 planning.

HOOWAH said:

Actually, all of Arthur's pass to Porter's pass can't be beat for scenery.

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And Cragieburn is a great ride when there's no snow.