My mother is planning to have one last big adventure as she’s getting on a bit and soon won’t want to make long overseas trips. So she has decided that New Zealand is the place to go.
Dopers, help me out here…where should she go and what should she see? What would be on your “don’t miss this” list?
Pancake Rock, Mount Cook and the rainforests therein. Stay someplace high enough where you get to see the Kia chewing your windshield wipers. Those birds are really cool. Go see the Kiwiw exhibit at the Wellington Zoo. There is no comparable exhibit. Wellington is a great town. There is a free museum, that is well worth it. You have to go to Rotarua of course. Hopefully she is up for some hiking. There is a lot of hiking to do in NZ.
I also hope that she will rent a car and drive. Driving around those winding roads is fun.
Some of our thoughts…
North Island
Cape Reinga : Right at the top amazing to see two oceans meet there
90 mile beach
Waiheke Island: Lovely to visit if you like wine you can visit the vineyards. Can get ferry there from Auckland
Coromandel
Hot Water Beach in near the top of the Coromandel: You dig in the sand
and make your own hot pool.
Waitomo Caves: Has Glow worms. Adventurous people may wish to try Black Water Rafting
Taupo
Rotorua :- (smells of sulpher)
[ul]
[li]Hot Pools and Whakarewarewa Geothermal Area [/li][li]Red Wood Forest[/li][li]Maori Buried Village[/li][li]Also some lovely lakes nearby[/li][/ul]
Mt Ruapehu and National Park region
Napier: lots of Art Deco buildings
In the North Island Auckland Zoo is very good and so is Hamilton’s zoo.
Last time I went to Central Auckland I was not impressed but it may have
changed. The Viaduct basin in Auckland can be good to visit - lots of waterside restaurants etc.
South Island
Nelson
Christchurch
Queenstown
Wanaka
Fox Glacier
Dunedin and the Otago peninsula (Albatross Sanctuary)
Milford Sound
Lots of vineyards about.
Si
The Shire, Rohan, and Gondor I hear are really beautiful no matter when you go. However, I would only give Mordor a flyover.
Visit Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateapokaiwhenuakitanatahu. 
I had a marvelous time on both of my trips to the South Island. The countryside is beautiful, the roads are great, and people are really friendly. I landed in Christchurch both times…I wonder how well they’ll be able to handle tourists in the near future?
It really depends on what she’s interested in I guess. Just a few comments;
Kaikoura in South island if you’re into whale, dolphin or seal watching.
Dunno if they still do it, but I got to swim with a pod of 200 dolphins there. Water was a tad cool though.
Otara
Lotsa thoughts, depending upon how active and adventurous she is…
The one big piece of advice is DON"T RUSH. New Zealand is a country best savoured slow. Do less and enjoy more is the general motto. If you wanna PM me I can send you the last travelogue I wrote for the South Island.
If I was going to New Zealand I’d want to go to Karekare to see where Together Alone was recorded.
I rushed, and I had an amazing time - but that also fits in with my personality. It depends on your mother’s and what she’s looking for. A lot of the things on my “don’t miss” list might not be on the list of a woman who is “getting on a bit.”
That said, some of the slower paced things I liked were the beach at Paihia and the Museum at Wellington. On the South Island, I took the cruise on Doubtful Sound and loved it & Dunedin and Christchurch became two of my favorite cities in the world. Is there anything specifically your mother likes to do?
One thing that was great about NZ is that their tourism board wants you to visit and have an amazing time. The official site has just about everything you could need to plan a vacation. In almost every town, there was a place for tourists to go and get useful information about what to do, where to go, and how to better enjoy their stays in NZ. Even strip mall size towns had an information kiosk with helpful people.
Thanks for all the responses!
I am seeing mum on Sunday to have a look at the holiday brochures she’s got. Knowing her, she’ll be looking for some kind of escorted tour so I really wanted some idea of the top sights/activities so that I can help her find the trip that will give her the best time.
In my experience, some of the best bits of NZ are near the tips. Cape Reinga, Bay of Islands in the north, Waikaremoana, East Cape in the east. Fiordland, Te Anau, Milford Sound, etc in the south.
I haven’t been south of Christchurch in tourist mode, so my experience runs only as far south as Akaroa. It is beautiful, and has the added attraction of viewing or swimming with the Hector’s dolphins, an indigenous species that’s about 1.5 m in length.
The Tranz Alpine train is great. We did a return trip in one day which was a bit of an overload of West Coast forests and alpine scenery. As Greymouth does have a beautiful beach (not one I would swim from though) and other attractions, take a one way trip and pick up a hire car there to travel the very uncrowded roads of the west coast. Go south to Fox Glacier, where you can explore around the foot of the glacier which comes to within 250m of sea level, right in the forest. After, head north through Greymouth, home of Monteith’s Brewery. They make a great tasting range of beers still, even after being taken over by NZ’s biggest brewery, Lion Nathan.
Stay at Westport overnight so you can take a day trip to Denniston. My grandmother was born there, on a plateau 1700 feet above sea level. The Denniston Incline once lowered full railway wagons of coal down what is up to a 1:1.25 grade. Even if railways leave you cold, this is a great spot to view the West Coast (provided it isn’t raining).
The top of the South Island has great beaches in Golden Bay, great scenery in Abel Tasman National Park and lovely small towns right through Tasman Bay to Nelson. Next door to Nelson, in Marlborough, there are extensive vineyards and wineries. There are also vineyards in the Wairarapa in the North Island and around Napier and Gisborne on the east coast.
Wellington, the capital, is not bad (I say that as a long time resident in Hamilton, one of the boring cities (go on, look it up)). The capital has Te Papa, the national museum, and there is a lot there for such a young country. (Only just 200 years of European occupation.)
Unless you have a fascination for cities, I’d not bother too much with Auckland. It used to have the moniker City of Sails, and it has a huge number of yachts that take to the harbours and Hauraki Gulf at weekends. It also has big traffic problems, something perhaps due to the roading being built 5 years after it’s needed. Most tourists just treat it as the gateway to New Zealand as it does have the most connections to other places, internally and externally.
(Added 11:57) Okay, most of what I wrote would be for a freedom traveller. Sorry. Still, Milford Sound and Cape Reinga are both places that have regular tourist coach trips to them.
Auckland is one of the most boring cities I’ve ever been to- and I’ve got family there, so I’ve seen it both as a “Tourist” and as a “Local”.
Rotorua is a must-see, while you’re sill in the North Island, and the Bay Of Islands is really nice- make sure you visit Russell and Waitangi, which is where colonisation in NZ (as well as the signing of the historic treaty) began.
Down in the South Island, the TranzAlpine Express is incredible, but accommodation is a real problem in Christchurch at the moment, what with the Earthquake and so on. Hanmer Springs is well worth visiting too, as is Queenstown/Wanaka. Otherwise, you can probably give the rest of it a miss unless you like skiing or tramping through bushland.
Don’t try and overdo it though, and bear in mind it’s really expensive to travel between the two islands as well. You either have to fly or get the ferry, and Petrol is horribly expensive too.
Having said all that, it is a beautiful country and the people there are friendly- but please, avoid “Lord Of The Rings” jokes, as everyone’s sick of them. 
Yeah, it’s a place people live and work… I guess some people come for touristy stuff but… meh… (And I love Auckland and live there). 
And traffic-wise Auckland is kinda like LA-writ-small.
For guided or self-tours I’d suggest Waimanguover Whakarewarewa… but the latter has its touristy charm too.
Yes, and there are lots of options for scenic cruises around the Bay of Islands.
Oh pshaw… I make it only about US$4.83 per US gallon at the moment.