Travel
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Wellington, NZ and South Island
We are heading to NZ in a month, into and out of Christchurch. Thus far I've booked three nights in Marlborough and have a rough itenerary that includes driving around most of the South Island. I am now thinking that it would probably be more relaxing for us to explore the northern part of the South Island, take the ferry over to the North Island an spend a couple of days around Wellington before going back to the South Island, driving down to heli-hike on one of the glaciers, and then driving back to Christchurch and heading home. If we did that we'd end up spending 24 hours less in the car. So, is the southern part of the North Island worth it? How many days would we need in Wellington? Any must sees nearby? Or would we be better off losing a day and driving around the South Island?
Re: Wellington, NZ and South Island
I haven't been...yet. We have to see queenstown, and so I looked at a ton of route options that included both islands or even a loop around only the south island, but I was told that driving will take longer than expected and I didn't want to drive every day (even for a couple hours) so our itinerary is now just 2 nights each in three southern cities.
I can see pretty cities anywhere, so my goal is to see all nature. I vote you stay on the south island, maybe visit beaches or hot springs.
I haven't been to Wellington, so I can't comment on it.
We did the drive-heavy loop of the South Island in November and I would agree that it was not the most relaxing trip. I think Google maps had our full loop listed as 1 day, 9 hours of driving (and it's true that they generally underestimate driving times there). It actually didn't feel THAT BAD, but it was a lot of moving around.
Instead of going to Wellington, could you head down to Queenstown or Wanaka to spend a couple days after your heli-hike? The drive from the glaciers down to Queenstown had some cool walking tracks that broke up the drive for us.
I'll be 100% honest as to where I'm coming from on this. I realized on our Christmas and New Year's trip to South Africa that we aren't big nature people. Three days of solid nature is our limit before H starts complaining that he's bored every half hour and I start wondering where my next set of four solid walls and a roof will be coming from. By the eighth day of appreciating nature my H will be electing to sit in the nearest pub and watch football or rugby or cricket or whatever happens to be on instead of whatever it is we had planned.
We like wine (which is why I was thinking about maybe going up to the North Island too--then we can hit up both Marlborough and Hawkes Bay). We like being around people. We like activity. We like some nature, but in small doses. Laying on the beach does not qualify as nature. If anyone knows of a great beach in the area I'd love to hear about it. One hike is enough for an entire trip (and we'll be helihiking on one of the glaciers, so that's taken care of) and driving through pretty countryside gets boring after the fifth hour of doing so. Basically, you're giving advice to someone who has the goal in life of dying having never slept outside.
Sibil--we'll be checking two, possibly three bags and will be seriously investing in wine skins, so if that's why you were asking the answer is a big yes.
We were there in early spring, so it was too cold to hit the beach. Where are you staying in Marlborough? We spent a couple nights in Blenheim and rented bikes to go wine tasting. Not sure if that is your style or not (the bikes do have 6-bottle carriers for buying along the way), but we had a lot of fun with it.
Baby248 - ETA 1/10/13
I want room for me! Although, if you could send me some Wairau chardonnay, that will maybe make up for it.
Abel Tasman is the only real lie on a beach area I can think of. You can take a water taxi and walk as much or little as you want. And it's close to Nelson which I think you'll enjoy. There are people and pubs and good food
Queenstown does have people. Think of it like a ski resort town. It's small, but walkable with tourist shops. It wasn't my favorite place; I'm glad we stayed in Wanaka instead. Wanaka is also small and walkable, but there's good food, a beautiful lake, a great coffee shop, and a winery, plus it's close to all the Otago wineries.
Wellington is definitely a bigger city, but I don't know that there's that much extra for a tourist when compared to Nelson, at least for someone like me who seeks out primarily good food. There are a couple museums if your'e into that. Originally we were also going to do Hawkes Bay and Marlborough, but adding that was getting to be a huge hassle.
While I love nature and hiking, we never slept outside on our whole trip. We also made sure to have walls
Also, we only drove one direction on the SI, so it was just one day of over 5 hours of driving.
Have you checked out the wine festival schedule? You'll be too late for the one in Devonport, but there might be others to hit up that could influence where you go.