New Zealand visit?

[oldwolf]

Greetings all,

My wife and I want to plan a trip to New Zealand. Does anyone have any suggestions on places to go? Things to do? Things to eat and not eat? No time frame on when we'll be going yet but hopefully within a year and during the warmer months. We're fairly active so we don't mind hiking, mtn biking or anything active. Oh, the cameras are coming with us.

TIA

[SNOOPY]

I really couldnt recommend one particular place to visit, everywhere is great. BUT, the South Island is IMO more beautiful. Depends on what you are after but the great outdoors is all there at your doorstep.
Whale watching/dolphin diving at Kaikoura, hiking the Glaciers (Franz Josef/Fox), the Mirror Lake (cant remember its actual name), Punakaiki, Arthurs Pass are a few that spring to mind when I think of the South Island.
North Island is great too (I live in the North), maybe I love the south because I dont live there.

[FrankLamont]

Hey well, the grass is always greener on the other side.

[Nicole]

I think Wellington is a must see spot (I might be biased) Urban, green, coasts, all in one spot. Plus you can catch the ferry across to the South Island and that trip has some great photo ops. SNOOPY has some great suggestions there for the South Island though. Depending on how long you're going for, driving from Auckland down to Wellington lets you hit some of the main North Island spots like Rotorua and the mountains. Then you can hit a lot of the main spots on the South Island by driving around too. It's a bit of a drive, but depending on how much time you have, it would let you see a lot!

[kencaleno]

Somewhere you shouldn't miss in the North Island is Rotorua with its Maori village and geothermal springs(Like "old faithful" in Yosemite),but South Island has wonderful scenics, Mountains,snow etc Regards, Ken

[kencaleno]

Originally Posted by SNOOPY

I really couldnt recommend one particular place to visit, everywhere is great. BUT, the South Island is IMO more beautiful. Depends on what you are after but the great outdoors is all there at your doorstep.
Whale watching/dolphin diving at Kaikoura, hiking the Glaciers (Franz Josef/Fox), the Mirror Lake (cant remember its actual name), Punakaiki, Arthurs Pass are a few that spring to mind when I think of the South Island.
North Island is great too (I live in the North), maybe I love the south because I dont live there.

Hey, Snoopy,whereabouts are you in the Tararuas-I am in Masterton, moved from Woodville some 5 years ago, regards, Ken

[SNOOPY]

really? I am in Eketahuna (you know... the big metropolis of) hehe, well the suburbs, dairy farming near the Ranges.

[kencaleno]

Originally Posted by SNOOPY

really? I am in Eketahuna (you know... the big metropolis of) hehe, well the suburbs, dairy farming near the Ranges.

Yes I remember,not so long back when Eketahuna was a laughing point,but it seems to do quite well, lately. Ken

[MHart]

My husband and I visited both the north and south islands a couple of years ago. You can't go wrong anywhere you visit. The south island seems to have more outdoor activities, but that may be just my perception. You'll have wonderful photo ops everywhere. Wellington is nice (weather wasn't good when we were there), but Auckland was my favorite city on the north island. We couldn't do everything, so we skipped Rotorua figuring it was similar enough to Yellowstone that we wouldn't miss much. Watch out for the one-lane bridges!

We rented a car when we flew into Auckland, returned it in Wellington, took the ferry to Picton, where we picked up another car. That's pretty common there.

We drove down the west coast of the south island--unbelievable scenery. It was much greener than Colorado, at least when we were there. There'd be a lot more similarities if we only had an ocean here. You'll want to go to Queenstown and Doubtful or Milford Sound. Christchurch and Dunedin are interesting with great architecture.

As far as eating. . . we stumbled onto some very nice restaurants at wineries. Not cheap, but very good. We ate very cheap at breakfast and lunch to be able to splurge on dinner. New Zealand lamb is incredible.

We were in NZ for about 21 days and could have spent twice that amount of time. There's a lot we didn't see.

Marilie

[oldwolf]

Thanks for the input all. Keep the tips coming. We'll probably try to go for 2 weeks if we have enough vacation.