New Zealand

I don't think I can truly put into words how beautiful New Zealand is, but I'll try. After many years of having this country on my list, I finally got to see all its beauty in person! It took many, many hours in the air to get there (and the loss of a full day!), but oh was it worth it. This post will basically be a breakdown of each day of our trip, along with some tips and suggestions for your visit. And yes, you must put NZ at the top of your list!

Day 1 - Auckland Arrival/Cathedral Cove

Our flight has us arriving from San Francisco, CA around 9:00 am local time in Auckland. We reserved a rental car for the week and it was super easy to find the rental car stations in the Auckland airport. Within a few minutes we had our keys and headed to the parking lot to get our car (with a quick pit stop at Dunkin' for coffee......yes, AKL has a Dunkin'!!!). Our car for the North Island part of our trip (more on the details of rental cars in both islands below) was a Holden SUV. Being the Americans we are, we didn't realize until about halfway through the trip that we were driving a Holden and not a Peugeot. They are both lions and VERY similar logos. Having never heard of Holden, we had no clue. Ohhhhhh America! haha

The plan for day 1 was to head east from the Auckland airport and drive to Cathedral Cove. Fun fact about my travel planning is that a LOT of places I've visited in the past few years have been a direct result of Windows screensavers. If you have Windows on your computer (at home or like me, at work) when your computer locks there are screensavers that auto load with pictures of locations around the world. If you hover your mouse over the "Like what you see?" sentence on the top right of the screen, it will tell you the location in the image. Well, Cathedral Cove was a screensaver for me last year and when I started planning my New Zealand trip, it was one of the first places I googled! I found it on the map and it was about a 2.5 hour drive from Auckland, so that was destination number one.

What google didn't tell me is the trek it would take to get to the cove once we arrived! But before we get to that, the drive to Cathedral Cove is worth mentioning. What this drive showed us is what would become the theme of this trip. Everywhere you look in New Zealand is beautiful! The roads in New Zealand are very windy. No matter which island we were on, almost every road we took had so many turns! While that did make the driving a little more difficult, it also meant that there were so many gasps and "OMGs" along our drives because you would turn around a bend and be met with the craziest views. Whether it be coastal views, hills/mountain views, forest, or a plethora of floral, the driving was so gorgeous. On our way from Auckland to Cathedral Cove we had a few unexpected surprises to stop and admire. After leaving the metropolis of Auckland, we were met with farmland filled with cows and sheep (which we would continue to see hundreds of throughout the week). Soon we were driving through a valley with the prettiest streams and so many different types of trees and flowers.

After pulling over to admire the stream and surrounding mountains, we continued on our way to Cathedral Cove. Along the roads of New Zealand there are a LOT of random pull off points. Some are just small pull off areas to allow cars to pass you, but some are meant for parking and exploring. As we made our way to Cathedral Cove we stopped at one of many pull offs to explore. We were driving along the eastern coast at this point and we noticed a lot of cars parked and people walking through a bunch of trees/plants towards to coast. We decided to join the crowd and boy were we glad we did! After a few minutes walk, we we overlooking the eastern coastline and it was gorgeous!

We took in the view for a few minutes, snapped a bunch of pics and videos, and then headed back to the car to get to the Cove. Here's when google failed me (or I failed to google enough...). We got to the car park for Cathedral Cove only to realize that we were nowhere near the actual beach/Cove. There were multiple options to get there: walk, shuttle bus, or boat. The walk would be about 35 minutes to get to the start of the trail to the Cove. It was very hot and not a cloud in the sky, so that option was a no! The boat was not running that day (for reasons still unknown...), so the shuttle bus it was! We foolishly thought that meant it would take us right to the beach and we'd walk out and see the Cove. Oh how wrong we were!!! The shuttle bus lets you off at the top of the stairs which take you down to start the hiking trail to get to the beach. IT. WAS. TOUGH. After 40 minutes of varying steep inclines and a ton of stairs down, we made it to the beach. To say I was exhausted is an understatement, especially knowing we'd have to turn around and do the 40 minute hike in the opposite direction, but oh was it worth it! Just look at how cool this place is:

After relaxing a bit on the beach, we made our way back through the trail and back to the shuttle to our car. I could've taken a nap right then and there, but we had to get back to Auckland and find dinner! We ended up in the Marina area of Auckland where many sailboats are docked (several America's Cup boats) and found a great burger joint. Day 1 and the trip was off to a splendid start!

Day 2 - Blue Springs & Rotorua

On our second day, we made our way from Auckland to Rotorua. Our drive to Rotorua was only about 2.5 hours, so it gave us time to make some pit stops. The best pit stop was the absolutely stunning Blue Springs. Known as the clearest water in all of New Zealand, it was one of the most colorful, beautiful places I've ever seen (yes, I'm using the word "beautiful" a lot in this post haha). It was about a 10 minute walk from the car park through this serene hillside area that was so quiet and peaceful. You walk along a short path and then arrive at the Springs and wow, just look at this amazingness:

I could've sat on the benches and stared at this water for hours because it was just so calming, but alas zipling was calling! We hopped back in the car and headed to Rotorua, or better known as "ROTOVEGAS" as the sign informed us. Rotorua came up on a lot of searches for "things to do in the North Island" and I see why. Even if you don't partake in any of the activities, the views alone from the top overlooking Lake Rotorua and the eastern coast in the distance are awesome. You take a gondola ride up to the top and once there, you can zipline down, followed by a 10 meter "quick jump" which was basically a mini-bungee jump where you fall backwards off a plank, and then you can also luge. We were super excited for the ziplining and didn't think much about the luge until we rode the first luge track! OMG it was so fun. Each person has their own individual luge cart and there are multiple tracks that take you on twists and turns down the hillside at a surprisingly fast pace! It's basically like a real like Mario Kart! It was seriously so much fun and a must if you find yourself in Rotorua!

The last part of our day in Rotorua was spent going on a Redwoods Nightlights Treewalk. Right near ROTOVEGAS is the Rotorua Redwoods. In the Whakarewarewa Forest you will find coastal redwood trees including the 6 hectares stand of Californian Redwoods The Treewalk takes you through the trees, high above along bridges and walkways. As stated on the Redwoods Treewalk website: "The Treewalk features 30 exquisite lanterns designed by world-renowned designer and sustainability champion David Trubridge. Floating between 9-20 metres above the forest floor, this award-winning, eco-tourism walk is 700 metres long, spans across 28 suspension bridges and 27 platforms and takes about 40 minutes to complete." It was such a sight to see. The canopy bridges were shaky and creeky and with the darkness and the illumination from the lanterns and lights, it made for such a cool experience. A friend of my dad's had recommended this and I'm so glad he did. Definitely a highlight of the trip!

Day 3 - Driving to Wellington

Day 3 was a LOT of driving, 10 hours total! We had to make our way from Rotorua to Wellington, but we went north then south so that we could see the northwestern coast of the North Island and Elephant Rock.......or so we thought. Instagram and the internet are great resources for finding things to do and places to see when traveling. However, as we learned on this day, not all things you find on social media are up-to-date. The highlight of Day 3 was supposed to be Elephant Rock, which is a rock formation on the northwestern coast that resembles an elephant. I saw this time and time again on Instagram when looking for things to see in New Zealand. Wellllllllll it wasn't until we got there that we realized two things: (1) the 2016 earthquake that rocked the country resulted in the "tusk" of the elephant completely breaking off, resulting in "Elephant Rock" just looking like a big rock formation now and (2) you can only reach the rock when it is low tide. When we arrived and parked, there was literally no way to get to the rock because we were there at high tide. Every picture I had seen prior to arriving was taken by people on the sand at the base of the rock. When we got there I said "how did anyone get that picture?!" only to then see the sign that informed visitors you can only get to the rock at low tide and gave a strong warning that you have a maximum of 2 hours to get there and back before the tide comes in again. Soooooo we did not get the picture I was planning because the "Elephant Rock" was no longer and we couldn't get to it even if it was still an elephant! We did however find a spot along to road to park and get pictures of the rock formation as it stands now. Not quite as stunning as the Elephant Rock, but still pretty nonetheless.

We continued the journey to Wellington and decided that since Elephant Rock was a bust (no pun intended), we had time to stop and look at anything else that presented itself along the way. Many times while driving in New Zealand, there will be brown signs (similar to U.S. historical sites signs) that indicate something to see and the distance. Since the rest of our day was just driving, we took advantage of some of these spots. The first sign we saw said "Whitecliffs Walkway 11 km" and we decided to follow. We ended up in a tiny town with a population of 117 in the Selwyn District. There wasn't really a car park once you arrived at the Walkway, so we just parked on the side of the road and made our way down to the water. The coast was so different from what we had seen at Cathedral Cove. The colors and height of the cliffs were awesome. It very much reminded me of Ireland or the southern coast of England. Definitely glad we made this stop!

As we drove on for the next 4 hours, we made a few more random stops and saw a few more scenic beauties like Mount Taranaki before finally arriving at Wellington. Not before I was pulled over for speeding. Fun fact: if there is no speed limit posted, the default is 100 kph. I learned this the hard way getting pulled over going 118, but luckily I got a nice cop who let me off with a warning. More likely once he realized I was a tourist, it wasn't worth giving me a ticket because what if I never paid it?! He said to me "you probably don't want to have to pay a ticket while on holiday do you?" I sure didn't! But from then on, cruise control was always on haha We checked into our amazing hotel (InterContinental Wellington) and enjoyed dinner at the waterfront. A very much needed indulgence after 10 hours in the car!

Day 4 - Wellington

We spent this day out of the car and explored the beautiful town of Wellington! Our day started with a delicious breakfast consisting of a traditional New Zealand treat: cheddar scones with butter. So tasty!!! We then made our way to the Wellington Cable Car to take us up to the Kelburn lookout and the Botanic Garden. The cable car is an old school funicular that takes you up the hillside on about a 5 minute ride. As you ascend to the top you start to take in the expansive views of the city of Wellington and Wellington Harbour. Then there's a tree lined path through the Botanic Garden that will take you back down to the city center. There were so many different species of flora and fauna and so many great smells. The path ends at the Rose Garden which featured hundreds of gorgeous rose bushes! It was a maze of colors and smells that was truly a sight to see.

Next we made our way toward Parliament House and the "Beehive" where the now famous "Ok boomer!" phrase was first spoken! I love when government buildings take advantage of fun architecture and make the otherwise boring into something fun. After a tour of Parliament House and the grounds, we continued on to the waterfront and Te Papa Tongarewa Museum. Once again, Instagram brought something fun to my attention and this time, it was as promised! The Toi Art Gallery of the Te Papa Tongarewa Museum featured an awesome exhibit called "Finale: Bouquet." This exhibit featured 200,000+ pieces of confetti, 6,000 strands, 68 grams per strand, for a total artwork weight of roughly 400 kg, which tool 6 installers 816 hours to install. It was like walking into a room filled with confetti. In the upper corners of the room there were fans blowing which made the confetti strands move and sway as you walked around the room. It was such a cool exhibit and totally Instagram worthy!

Day 5 - Island Hopping

We started day 5 (Thanksgiving Day!) by hopping on the ferry to the South Island.This was a relatively easy and slow day, with just one activity on the books: whale watching. The ferry ride ended up being a nice added addition to the day because the views traveling from the North Island to the South Island were so pretty (as with pretty much everything in New Zealand)! As we arrived to the town of Picton on the South Island, the channel to get there was surrounded by beautiful mountains. It reminded me of the Beagle Channel off the southern tip of Argentina. Once off the ferry and in our new rental car (another Holden), we were on our way to ‎the city of Kaikōura for our whale watching tour. This tour took us off the southern coast of the South Island to look for sperm whales. We weren't guaranteed to see any whales since wild animals are unpredictable, but we ended up coming across a giant sperm whale that was sleeping! It's funny to think about whales sleeping, but essentially he just chilled there on the surface of the ocean, breathing through the blowhole, napping away. While cool to see such a large whale, because he was napping meant no tail shots for us. While we may not have seen much movement with him, we saw a ton of movement when a pod of dusky dolphins swan up to our boat and joined us for a while. They were weaving and dodging and jumping all over the place!

After we got back to shore we continued along the southern coastal highway and took in even more of the scenic beauty before finally arriving at our base for the next two nights: Christchurch. We were thrilled to arrive at the Crowne Plaza Christchurch and get a quick bite to eat nearby and then some much needed rest before our big day on Friday...Lake Tekapo!!!!!

*Note: There is really not much to do in Christchurch. If I could plan our trip over again, I would've cut one night in Christchurch and driven down to Queenstown for one night before heading back to Auckland. Just an FYI :)

Day 6 - Lake Tekapo

Day 6 was the day we went to the place that inspired the whole trip! I'm not joking when I say that either. I literally planned this entire trip around visiting Lake Tekapo when the lupins are in bloom. As mentioned above, Windows screen savers have shown me so many places around the world I want to visit. I remember seeing pictures of Lake Tekapo when the movie "A Wrinkle In Time" was filming there a few years ago and it looked so turquoise and pretty. However, when a picture of Lake Tekapo with the lupin flowers in bloom graced my computer screen, I was in awe. I couldn't get over the colors of the flowers and the snow capped mountains in the back. I immediately had to google and learn more about where this was and what these flowers were. I was originally planning to visit New Zealand one year for New Year's Eve to continue my goal of spending NYE in every time zone. But once I learned that lupins are in full bloom in late November, a Thanksgiving trip it would be! Yes, I planned this entire trip around the estimated bloom time of the lupin flowers. Obviously there was risk in this planning since we're talking about nature here, there's no guarantee! I was checking the "Recent" pics on the Lake Tekapo geotag page of Instagram every day for weeks prior to the trip trying to gauge whether they'd be in bloom, not yet bloomed, or past bloom when we arrived. Well, let's just say that when we turned the corner on the highway and the mountains and lake came into view, we audibly gasped! Right there in front of us was the most beautiful thing I have ever seen in my entire life! Words can't even begin to describe how amazing this place was between the colors and the scent of the flowers. It was incredible! We spent over an hour just walking through the flowers, taking pictures, using the drone, and just continuously saying "Wow" as we looked around. I could go on and on, but I'll let the pictures speak for me instead :)

I mean, come on!

Day 7 - Back to Auckland

We flew back to Auckland for our final day in New Zealand. Since we already went into the city center and the marina on our first night, we decided to take the car and explore the surrounding areas of Auckland instead. We drove out to Manukau Heads Lighthouse and once again (I know I'm like a broken record here) saw the beauty that this country has to offer. No matter where you drive or what coast you're on, it is just amazing. We hiked up (much shorter hike than Cathedral Cove thank God!) to the lighthouse and took in all that gorgeous views. New Zealand is not only beautiful but there is such a sense of peace no matter where you go. From the scenery, to the people, to the animals, to the plants and trees, it is just a calming place.

We ended our trip with dinner at Orbit 360° Dining. This restaurant is situated at the top of Auckland's Sky Tower and rotates 360 degrees while you dine. It gives you every view possible of Auckland, the coast, and beyond. It was the perfect ending to a wonderful trip!

Things to Know:

Rental Cars - When booking a rental car, spend the extra money (it won't be much) and get an SUV! There is a lot of construction on the roads in New Zealand due to still repairing and updating after the 2016 earthquake. Many times we were driving through dirt roads, gravel roads, etc. where construction was taking place. Or we'd have to drive into a ditch to get around the construction. If we were in a lower car, I would have been nervous driving. Also, we didn't learn this until we returned our car in Wellington, but the rental car companies in New Zealand offer "window shields" to put on the windshield to protect from rocks/gravel. We were lucky that we didn't get any cracks, but our car had 3 cracks in it already and we saw many pieces of gravel hit the window during the drive. Definitely worth the extra $5!

Also, if you're exploring both islands with a rental car, you can return your car at the ferry port and then pick up a new one when you get off the ferry. This is 100% the way to go because the ticket price for the ferry WITH a car is much more expensive. It was a seamless process too because so many tourists do it on a daily basis. You park your car in the parking lot of the terminal, hand the keys to the rental car staff, and make your way to the ferry. When you get off the ferry, follow the signs for the rental car counters and they will have keys waiting for you to take a new car!

Gas Prices - Prepare yourself, as gas is expensive in New Zealand!!! I know that on most international trips, gas prices tend to be higher than we pay in the United States, but New Zealand was a lot more! We did the math after one of our fill-ups and it came out to a little over $5.00 a gallon for gas. Can you imagine if gas was $5.00 a gallon in the US?! People here would lose their minds! Needless to say, make sure to account for this expense in your budget.

Bathrooms - One interesting and nice fact about visiting New Zealand is the abundance of public restrooms. As mentioned above, we drove a lot! Many times the drives would find us in the middle of nowhere or between towns with not much to see or do (other than admire the views), but so often there would be public restrooms along the roads. They were always very clean and up-to-date. I was pleasantly surprised how frequently we saw restrooms on the roads. It was a nice relief to not have to use a gas station bathroom like most road trips in the States!

Nature/Māori Culture - The Māori are the indigenous Polynesian people of New Zealand and you will see a lot of their culture throughout New Zealand. Our whale watching tour was operated by Māori and they really show you how much they care about nature and wildlife and all its inter-connectivity. You really get a sense of it while in New Zealand by seeing how they respect their land and their desire to protect the environment and work in harmony with nature. It's inspiring and such a change from what the rest of the world is doing right now. While we didn't get a chance, a friend of mine visited over Christmas/New Year and went to a traditional Māori show. She said it was an amazing experience. She recommended it if I ever go back and it is definitely at the top of my list now. The Māori way of life really is what we should all strive for given what is happening with our planet right now!

Kia pai te haerenga!