The North Island of New Zealand

Now that I have gone over all of our stops on the trip, I thought I should do some summing up posts. I have a coworker going to New Zealand in September, and two friends there right now. For some reason, everyone is just doing the north island. Well, here is the message I wrote up for Richard and Mercedes to help them plan. It is a pretty good overview of what is there:

The areas are listed roughly in a North to South order. For our getting around, we flew into Auckland and took a taxi to our hotel. We had a bus tour that took us to the Bay of Islands and Waitangi Treaty Grounds one day, used taxi and city bus to get to Kelly Tarltons the next, and then another bus tour took us to Rotorua via Waitomo.

In Rotorua, we got transportation with the tour to Hobbiton (they were great) and with the Hangi, and there was a local shuttle for Rainbow Springs. Then we flew out of Rotorua to get to Queenstown. On the buses I could see road signs for all the places we were skipping, so I know you can do a lot more if you are driving yourself.

For hotels, we only stayed in two. In Auckland we stayed at the Rendezvous hotel. It was nice, but it is more for business travel (all the airline staff stays there). It was not convenient for attractions or food. If you go down a few blocks to Queen Street, there are restaurants and shopping, but there is nothing you can get to that fast, and they don’t really even have any vending machines to speak of. You can probably do better.

In Rotorua we stayed at the Comfort Inn Gwendoline. They were very nice, but the room was a little dumpy, and since we primarily picked them because they said they had laundry, we were very disappointed to find one washing machine and one very weak dryer. Also, it is on the main road into town, but way at the end. You can do better here too. Also, there are cool things to do in and around Rotorua, but it is a sulfur spring, and it stinks.
Places to go:

Waipoua Kauri Forest:
We did not make it here, but I would have liked to. I guess this is their equivalent of redwood or sequoia forests, only the trees are famous more for getting wide than tall.
http://www.natureandco.co.nz/land_and_wildlife/regions/northland/for-park/visit-waip.php3

Bay of Islands:
This is a bay with many islands. It is considered very scenic, and there are different boat tours you can do. It is good to see, and this was the only place where we saw dolphins. That being said, we hated our boat ride. It was the Excitor Fast Boat tour, and the way it was built we were constantly being stung in the face with salt water, to where we could barely keep our eyes open. There are lots of other boats available; don’t take the Excitor if you go. You do get whales and dolphins in the area, so some tours may be specifically for that.
http://www.bayofislands.net/

Waitangi:
You can learn a lot about the history at the Waitangi treaty grounds. The meeting house Whare Runanga is on the grounds, where the carvings represent all of the island tribes, and an amazingly long boat (can carry 150, takes at least 100 to paddle), as well as a nature trail with native plants labeled.
http://www.waitangi.net.nz/

Muriwai Gannet Colony:
You can get some good bird watching here, and you are in exactly the right time of year for them (August and September).
http://www.newzealand.com/travel/sights-activities/scenic-highlights/coastal-highlights/scenic-highlight-details.cfm/businessid/69652.html

Coromandel Hot Water Beach:
At low tide you can dig your own hot springs and take a warm bath.
http://www.aatravel.co.nz/101/MustDo_Hot-Water-Beach.html

Kelly Tarlton’s Antarctic Adventure:
There is an Antarctic habitat set up where you can take a snowcat ride and see King and Gentoo penguins. That was pretty cool, and although you may see some wild penguins on the north island, all the main penguin viewing areas that I know of are on the south island. Then they have an underwater walkthrough area with different sharks and fish, a ray tank, smaller aquariums with other animals, and they have a dead giant squid on display. It was pretty good, but don’t go on a weekend. There is an hourly shuttle from downtown Auckland to it, and the shuttle is free, but if they are crowded, they will just leave when they are full, and that was frustrating for us. Still, much worse on weekends.
http://www.kellytarltons.co.nz/home/page.aspx

Waitomo Glowworm Caves:
There are actually three caves here: Waitomo, Ruakuri, and Aranui. We only went into Waitomo, which is where you see the glowworms, and part of the trip is by boat. It is worth seeing, but we only got a partial tour because there were heavy rains, and the water was getting too high. That could be a real possibility for you too. I wouldn’t have minded seeing the other caves, but we were part of a tour, and it only covered the one. In addition to regular cave admissions there are rafting trips and adventure options, so that may be something to think about.
http://www.waitomo.com/

Kiwi House:
This would be one place to see kiwis and other birds. We did not get there, but it was another place I would have liked to try.
http://www.kiwihouse.org.nz/

Temple:
There is a temple in Hamilton, and if you are driving, you could easily get there.
http://www.lds.org/temples/main/0,11204,1912-1-47-2,00.html

Hangi:
This is the New Zealand equivalent of a luau, and you should really try and get to one. I imagine that many towns have them, but for some reason all of the ones I know are in Rotorua. We went to the Tamaki Maori Village there, but there were at least two others.
http://www.maoriculture.co.nz/
http://www.mitai.co.nz/
http://www.nzmaori.co.nz/

Rainbow Springs Nature Park:
If you are in Rotorua, we do highly recommend this one. I don’t know if it has as many different types of birds as the Kiwi House, but they have some good ones, and trout and reptiles, and non-native animals that the European settlers brought with them, and the Kiwi Encounter is great. You see kiwi eggs and chicks and adults, and learn a lot. Auckland has a zoo where you are supposed to be able to see kiwis, but one woman told us they paid $40 there and never saw one. We saw many kiwis here.

Rotorua in general:
We only did the hangi and Rainbow Springs here, but we heard good things about the Rotorua Museum of Art and History, and that the Agrodome was more for kids. Mount Tarawera and the Buried Village could have been cool, but we didn’t go or talk to anyone who went.
http://www.rotoruamuseum.co.nz/
http://www.agrodome.co.nz/
http://www.mttarawera.co.nz/

Hobbiton:
We really enjoyed this tour. Not only was the tour of the movie set interesting, but then we got to see a demonstration of sheep shearing, and bottle-feed baby lambs, which I am pretty sure you would love. I think we saw the most sheep between Rotorua and Matamata.
http://www.hobbitontours.com/

Not sure if you are fans at all of Split Enz, Crowded House, or the Finn Brothers, but there may be two more points of interest if you are.

Te Awamutu Museum:
The Finn brothers were born in this town, so the museum has an exhibit on them. It would probably be a very short side trip, but it’s fairly close to some of the other towns.
http://www.tamuseum.org.nz/

Sharondelier:
Neil’s wife Sharon designs chandeliers and jewelry, and has a gallery in Auckland. Actually, she seems to be moving away from the jewelry, but when we were planning the trip she had earrings and necklaces too. It is only open on weekdays, so we were not able to make it.
http://www.sharondelier.com/

Let us know if you have any other questions. I have blog accounts of the places we went at http://sporktogo.blogspot.com/. I was writing about the North Island from basically March through May. Also, I did two updates from the road back when they were fresh.

http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2008/10/bay-of-islands.html
http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2008/10/rotorua-stinks-literally.html