New Zealand Travel Package

New Zealand Travel Package -Getting Around

If you plan on travelling between the North and South Island, you have two primary choices. You can fly between a northern and a southern city, or you can take the ferry from Wellington to Picton. In fact, you have the option of taking a train between many of the principal cities on both islands. To that point, we highly recommend taking the TranzAlpine train on the South Island. For more information please visit our post on trains and other transport options.

In addition, another option of getting around New Zealand is to rent a small camping vehicle. We noticed a number of people renting just such vehicles from Jucy. If you are a camper, you might want to try it.

New Zealand Travel Package – Auckland and the North Island

Auckland is the former capital of New Zealand, and its largest city. Wellington is the current capital. (More on Wellington, later). Many call Auckland the City of Sails. Auckland sits on the Hauraki Gulf, and the Waitemata Harbor, a Maori word meaning sparkling waters. In fact, the reason for calling Auckland the sailing city is because most people spend a lot of time on the water. New Zealand defeated Dennis Conors and the Americans in 1995 to win the America’s Cup and defended in Waitemata Harbour in 2000. New Zealand is currently the defending Champion for the competition in 2024.

Auckland Wine Culture

All of New Zealand is very active in the wine business. Auckland is no exception. To explore wine in Auckland, you must visit Waiheke Island. To get to the wineries, you need to take a ferry ride to Waiheke Island. Waiheke is a rapidly growing wine region with excellent wines. It is a fairly hilly island. They learned to use the hills to avoid the winds and were able to produce quality Bordeaux grapes in certain parts of the island. This is unusual as most of the other New Zealand wine regions only produce lighter varietals. Mudbrick and Goldie Estate are two of the better wineries on the island. The University of Auckland now owns Goldie Estate; it is training new wine makers. We thought of returning to school…..

Auckland Museums

There are a number of quality museums in Auckland. Our favorite is the Auckland War Museum. This is an excellent museum with the largest collection of Maori artifacts in the country. The museum has wonderful traveling exhibits. For a complete description of the museum, please visit Our Favorite Museums Post.

Tauranga and Rotorua, North Island, New Zealand

Tauranga is a port city just south of Auckland on the North Island. Like Auckland, Tauranga is an ideal location to arrange a trip to Rotorua. Rotorua is a popular tourist location, steeped in Māori history. You can attend a Māori meal at various places including Whakarewarewa and Te Puia which are similar to a Hawaiian luau. Not surprisingly, this is also the home to the Hobbitron which is the filming studio for the Lord of the Rings films. Lastly, this is a highly active thermal reserve area. Cos and Robin visited Hell’s Gate which has arguably the most active thermal action in the area. It reminded us of Yellowstone National Park.

Northland and the Bay of Islands

Treaty House and Grounds at Waitangi

New Zealand Travel Package – Wellington

Wellington is the capital of New Zealand and the southern most city on the North Island. The ferry to Picton from Wellington is a very busy route for people traveling between the islands, across the Cook Strait. For more information about Ferries please see our post on other transport options.

The Te Papa Tongarewa Museum in Wellington is the National Museum of New Zealand. It contains an incredible exhibit remembering New Zealand’s role in WWI. The statues representing the soldiers are larger than life. We found this to be a very emotional experience. Please see our Museums Post to see more about New Zealand’s great museums.

While in Wellington, Cos and Robin rented eBikes and had a great time riding around the waterfront, although Robin almost wiped out a wayward elderly lady who had no concept of her danger.

The Wellington Cable Car is also a great way to see the city from up high and to visit the Botanic Garden. To see more about the Botanic Garden and other gardens, please visit our Gardens Post.

Wellington is a city with a real sense of art and fun. The pictures below represent the thoughts of elementary school children regarding what they like about the wharf and the waterfront.

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New Zealand Travel Package – Queenstown, and the South Island

Queenstown is a must visit place. It borders Lake Wakatipu, a beautiful lake surrounded by striking mountain ranges. The pure beauty of the place is beyond incredible. There are things to do in Queenstown for every visitor. Hiking and extreme sports are two of the more popular activities. Helicopter trips onto The Remarkables and to Milford Sound are extraordinary. The Remarkables are a gorgeous, extremely Rocky Mountain range on the southeastern shore of Lake Wakatipu. They host one of Queenstown’s three ski resorts which are all spectacular.

Central Otago Wine Region

We particularly enjoyed the wine tasting in the Central Otago region. We booked The Wine Hopper through Get Your Guide. At first this sounded a little suspect, but we found it was a fine way to find just the vinyard you want to visit, and thenmove on to the next one.

This area has some incredible Pinot Noir wines. Most of the wineries are small and family owned. Most wines do not leave the immediate area as exports. Some of our favorite wineries are Amisfield, Mount Rosa, Nookies Palette and Coal Pit (see pictures). Interestingly, Central Otago, albeit in the Southern Hemisphere, like the Burgundy Region in France and the Willamette Valley in Oregon, USA are all located on the 45th parallel of latitude.

Franz Joseph Glacier

The town of Franz Joseph, named after the former Austrian Emperor, is located in a rain forest area on the west coast of the Southern Island. The trip from Queenstown to Franz Joseph crosses some beautiful mountain territory and is a challenging but rewarding five to six hour drive.

The two glaciers in the area, Franz Joseph and the Fox Glacier, are two of the three glaciers in the world which connect to a rain forest. The Department of Conservation and local naturalists are working very hard to make this area pest free to allow the native bird population to flourish.

New Zealand Travel Package – Greymouth to Christchurch

After Cos and Robin visited Franz Joseph, they ventured North to Greymouth to catch the TranzAlpine Train to Christchurch. The five hour train ride through Arthur’s Pass is one of the great train rides in the world. (See our post on Trains for more information). The mountain views are spectacular. Despite the mountainous terrain that the train passes, here are some of the largest “sheep stations” in the country.

Christchurch

Christchurch is the second biggest city in New Zealand after Auckland. Back to back earthquakes in 2010 and 2011 occured in Christchurch. The 2011 quake hit directly in the central city and did a tremendous amount of damage. Cos was on a cruise in 2012 and it was still not possible to land and visit the city. As the city sits on a fault line, buildings cannot exceed three stories in height. This should limit the disaster from a future quake.

As of 2023, there are still many remnants of the earth quakes, the most significant is the Christchurch Cathedral. The Cathedral not only lost its spire in the earthquake, it suffered serious damage throughout. Nevertheless, Christchurch has a renewed spirit. It is thriving and a fun place to visit.

In addition to the sheep stations high in the mountains, sheep farms surround Christchurch. While in Christchurch, we visited a sheep farm. We saw the farm owner trains sheep dogs and even saw a sheep shearing demonstration. Apparently this was the sheep’s first shearing, so she was understandably nervous. As was Robin.

Christchurch is in the province of Canterbury. Canterbury gets its name from the town in England which is the home of Church of England. The Archbishop of Canterbury, who is the head of the Anglican Church is located there. As such, Christchurch has a strong tie to England and the Anglican Church.

Picton

The first town you come to on the South Island is Picton. Like all the ports on the South Island, the export of timber is big business as evidenced below. Not only does the timber grow faster in this part of the world, but the palm trees appear to grow taller.

Picton is also the gateway to the famous Marlborough wine region, although with an eight hour cruise stop it is too far to go out and really enjoy the wineries. Better to book an overnight stay to visit Kim Crawford and the other famous Marlborough Sauvignon Blancs.

While in town, we visited two museums: The Edwin Fox Museum and the Whaling Museum. Both museums tell a good story about the history of Picton but are quite modest in size. The Edwin Fox was a 19th century sailing vessel that carried British settlers to New Zealand and criminals to Australia. It is no longer in sailing shape but was worth learning about it and stepping on to the ship. The whaling museum is less impressive. However, the harpoon gun used on the whaling ships is very substantial.

Dunedin – New Zealand’s Scottish Town

Unlike Christchurch, Scottish settlers founded Dunedin and, as such, it doesn’t have the same Anglican roots. Nevertheless, Dunedin is a fun place to visit and a great place to go to school. The campus of the University of Otago consumes a large land mass in the city and the student population is very visible in town. Robin’s daughter Hillary attended the university for her junior year in college and frankly it was life-changing for her. The campus is very attractive.

Like ChristChurch, Cruise ships need to dock in Port Chalmers and requires a shuttle to get into town. Port Chalmers is a typical New Zealand port city, small and timber oriented. It has a Scottish Church and a classic system for letting all the boat captains in the harbor know the exact time. This works by raising the ball at a precise time on the flag pole high above the harbor. The views of Dunedin are spectacular, especially from Signal Hill Road where the lady guards the view.

New Zealand Travel Package – Fjordland National Park

A New Zealand travel Package or a cruise are the best ways to visit the National Park. One of our favorite Hidden Gems is the Fjordland. It is located at the Southern end of the South Island and consists of a number of sounds. The most well-known is Milford Sound. But Dusky and Doubtful Sounds are equally impressive. The tall, steep mountains of the region go directly into the waters of the sounds and create very deep waters. This allows cruise ships to enter the fjords which is the best way to experience the national park. While there, we saw no other cruise ships, although there were many around. There had been a sensitivity to a certain growth on their hulls that precludes them from sailing the fjords. The term is “dirty bottom” which we found to be kind of funny. However, imagine booking a cruise to see this majesty, only to discover that your ship had a dirty bottom……unhappy cruisers, they are.

New Zealand’s First People – The Maori

As we travel, we love to learn something about the First or Indigenous People. The Māori in New Zealand are the most interesting yet. A little less than one milliion Māori are living in New Zealand. This is more than 17% of the population of the country.

To end fighting, the British and the Maori signed the treaty of Waitangi in 1840. The agreement included protection of the Maori’s land rights. However, the Māori lost much of their land in the second half of the 19th century as a result of bad land deals and further wars. Finally, the New Zealand government is offering and negotiating reparations with the various tribes. For more information please see our Indigenous Peoples post.

Our Favorite Restaurants

Here is a list of our recommended restaurants from our 2023 trip to New Zealand. However, if you wish to see which of these restaurants made our highly rated top-50 list, please go to Top 50 Restaurants.

City	Restaurant	Overview	Our Review
Auckland	FISH	Polished setting at the Hilton Hotel offering fine seafood dishes in contemporary décor.	The restaurant is beautiful with views of the cruise ships (we looked at the Queen Victoria during dinner).  Our waiter was enthusiastic and suggested not only our meal but also the wine.  A great experience before leaving on our cruise.
Paihia	Charlotte’s Kitchen	Located on a wharf with a view of the Bay of Islands, this is the only place to eat in Paihia. The inspiration for Charlotte’s Kitchen was Charlotte Badger a woman of interest, passion, strength, daring and just a little bit naughty.	Service was great and so was the food.  Emphasis on local seafood and pizza.  Busy, so get a reservation.
Queenstown	Eichardt’s Grille	Located a stone’s throw from the shore of Lake Wakatipu, the Grille offers Aotearoa produce cooked with a French flair.	The food is anything from a seafood chowder and onion soup to eggplant tart and of course, lamb.  Good sized portions.
Queenstown	Rata Restaurant	Southern dining in New Zealand is quite different from Southern US cooking!  Some of the best producers and growers locally.  Otago wines are highlighted. The dining room features a wall photo of a native forest, giving you a sense of wilderness while being in downtown Queenstown.  Michelin starred Chez Josh Emett	The food and service are excellent with great suggestions from the server.  We loved the lamb and the wine was outstanding.