Amidst grottos of fern
About 4 walkers, both guided and independent, tramp Fiordland’s Hollyford Track each year. The Australian’s John Borthwick writes that New Zealanders’ “love of hoofing it over hill, dale and scrub, tramping, not rugby, is…
News of New Zealanders via Global Media
Distance makes special
New Zealand “is the ideal destination to gain maximum distance from everyday life” describes German magazine Geo in a special edition about this country, which includes stunning photographs of Fiordland, Nugget Point and Hoopers…
“Tramping is a Way of Life in New Zealand”
and we wear grass skirts … Michigan’s mlive.com looks at New Zealand’s “love affair with tramping”, falls for the guide’s gospel, and admires our extensive National Parks system, including ‘the finest walk in the world’: the…
Rugby and Much More
The arrival of a 25 metre-long New Zealand rugby ball on Circular Quay “within cooee of the Sydney Opera House” marks one year until the 211 Rugby World Cup kicks off. As a conspicuous…
Ride of Your Life
Heli-biking in Queenstown is “an exhilarating experience and a must for anyone visiting” the southern city, recommends the Telegraph’s Tarquin Cooper. “Visit New Zealand for rest, relaxation and rugby; unless, you’re a die-hard who…
In search of the real deal
“When you’re a New Zealander, or ‘Kiwi’, as they like to call themselves, you seem to take that rite-of-passage world trip for a year or two — sleeping in hostels and living out of…
Buckle up team
A number of All Blacks, coach Graham Henry and rugby commentator Tony Johnson feature in Air New Zealand’s latest in-flight safety video. Henry, a former secondary school headmaster, playing the role of captain,…
World Cup Promotion
Ambassador to Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay Darryl Dunn is promoting Rugby World Cup 211 holiday packages in New Zealand. The concept the New Zealand Embassy is trying to instil in the Argentine market is…
Pure Advice for Coast
Former CEO of New Zealand Tourism and creator of the 100% Pure New Zealand campaign, George Hickton, was the keynote speaker at a gathering of 3 tourism sector operators making up the new Australian…
Fear the Cone
“The big daddy of New Zealand’s South Island fields has a reputation for being big, bad and nasty — in a good way,” Rachael Oakes-Ash writes for The Sydney Morning Herald. “Some whisper about…
Ski resort purchase
Auckland-based entrepreneur Nick Wood has bought the Teton Pass Ski Resort, west of Choteau, Montana for just under $41, and will spend a further $4 million upgrading the area over the next three years….
Following Frodo
Fiordland’s Routeburn track may attract significantly fewer visitors to it than the Milford Sounds, but the “majestic, snowcapped peaks in every direction, along with waterfalls and hidden tarns” are well worth the hike says…
Tourists keep coming
Statistics New Zealand has released figures which show the number of overseas visitors arriving in New Zealand for short term stays has topped 2.5 million for the first time in the past 12 months….
Dream team celebrated
The New Zealand Olympic Committee has decided to pay tribute to the world’s most famous mountaineering duo by naming the country’s Commonwealth Games logo “2928 Hillary and Tenzing”. The Games will be held in…
Te Kano released
On New Zealand’s National Pavilion Day at the World Expo 21 in Shanghai a 1-meter long, three-meter wide canoe made of 35-year-old kauri was gifted to China. At the ceremony, a spiritual leader from…
Where the locals go
“Sometimes in New Zealand the differences between us and them become much greater than a few murky vowel sounds and divided rugby and cricket loyalties,” The Australian’s Nicole Jeffery writes. Driving SUVs in snow…
One Great Ride
The first legs of the 3km New Zealand Cycle Trail have been opened between Ruapehu and Whanganui. This 242km section of the trail will take four to six days to ride, with varying levels…
Peak Design
En-route to Mount Aoraki, India’s Economic Times’ reporter Bidisha Bagchi stops off at Lake Pukaki and, “after admiring the majestic blue of the lake that came from the rock particles in the glaciers —…
Formidable Kicks
Two surfing legends are taking on New Zealand’s most rugged waves off the coast of Fiordland for an episode of the Discovery Channel series Storm Surfers. The Storm Surfers’ — Australians Tom Carroll and…
Wwow What a Wwoof
From their wwoofing holiday in Northland, Californian couple Jacob and Kendall Madden describe their time spent working on five organic farms in the region in a guide about what it means to be a…
Peace reigns supreme
New Zealand has been named the most peaceful nation for the second year running in the fourth annual Global Peace Index (GPI). Compiled by global think tank Institute for Economics and Peace, the report…
Anything but the Bungy
Lyttelton-based Joe Bennett, author of Hello Dubai: Skiing, Sand and Shopping in the World’s Weirdest City, tells the Telegraph why Queenstown is his kind of town. “It’s the main visitor town of New Zealand’s…
Edgy stroll
The best way to begin your New Zealand adventure is, according to the Telegraph’s Tarquin Cooper, with a walk around the top of Auckland’s 328m Sky Tower. The Sky Tower is the tallest structure…
Wacky Winter Stunts
Queenstown’s Winter Festival hits the southern town for the 35th year this June with an estimated 6, revellers expected to attend the week-long festivities. While there are big-ticket items — free concerts (Dragon headline…
Day tripping
Oft considered more English than England, Christchurch, New Zealand’s oldest city offers a preferable moderate climate, fresh contemporary Antipodean cuisine and a host of outdoor activities in and about the city limits. The Sydney…
Great Barrier secrets
Escaping the New Zealand mainland, The Sydney Morning Herald’s Rob McFarland takes a four-hour boat trip to Great Barrier Island and “a ruggedly beautiful wilderness”. “The Barrier, as it’s referred to by the locals,…
Harmony and Fury
The BBC’s Sydney correspondent Nick Bryant “reflects on New Zealand’s mix of controlled fury, subtle charm and social harmony, and asks why the rest of the world can’t be more like it” in an…
Feast Your Eyes on This
“Rest, relaxation and rugby. What more could you want?” asks the Telegraph in an article written in the build up to the Rugby World Cup 211. When it comes to breathtaking beauty it is…
Most beautiful of all
Fiordland’s Routeburn and Greenstone Tracks, combined at 7km and both within the World Heritage-listed area of Te Wahipounamu in south-west New Zealand, make for “what might be the most beautiful walk in the world’s…
Island Paradise
Waiheke Island’s Mudbrick Vineyard & Restaurant is recommended by the Wall Street Journal in an article about worldwide wine tours. Waiheke Island features alongside the Barossa Valley, Australia; Western Cape, South Africa and Grover…
Fame becomes them
Tickets for The Flight of the Conchords’ two May shows at Dublin’s Olympia Theatre sold out in a record 12 seconds. “It’s all just weird,” Bret McKenzie says. But then he finds a lot…
Collaborative honour
Director, Peter Jackson, has been knighted by Governor-General, Sir Anand Satyanand, at an investiture ceremony in Wellington. Jackson’s knighthood was for services to the arts in New Zealand. “The truth is, making movies is…
Especially select
New Zealanders have a love of coffee, wine, water and an extraordinary, “relentless” particularity for those beverages, for dogs, sport, even driveways and beech trees, writes Peter Miller for Seattle news site Crosscut. “Water…
Backcountry Best
“New Zealand offers some of the best, and most extreme, heli-skiing on the planet”, according to The Sydney Morning Herald’s Craig Tansley who surveys New Zealand’s world-class fields. “There are over 400 runs to choose from…
Rite of passage
“Having a towering, tattooed man press his nose against mine has to be one of the more unusual and enjoyable greetings I have experienced,” describes Victoria Mitchell for Scottish newspaper The Press and Journal….
Children Allowed
At the “sophisticated” Poronui Lodge near Lake Taupo The Sydney Morning Herald’s Max Anderson is relieved to find there is also room for his six-year-old boys. “It’s a little-known fact that most of New…
Best Northern Beaches
The North Island’s top beaches are named by The Sydney Morning Herald’s Bruce Elder, who writes that those suggested are so good that no trip to New Zealand would be complete without visiting them….
Gandalf’s Return
The Hobbit, produced by Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh, will begin filming in New Zealand in July with Sir Ian McKellen once again taking the role of Gandalf the Grey. The film, and its…
Adrift on Lush Rakiura
“It’s from the air that Stewart Island reveals itself,” describes The Independent’s Ben Ross on a trip to Rakiura, or ‘Glowing Skies’. “All but one-sixth of the land is protected by national park statues,…
Taste for Trout
New Zealand’s trophy trout fishing is popular with anglers from all over the world who travel to the North Island for lake fishing and to the South Island for sight fishing, and for often…
Relaxed and Recumbent
Creator of Rotorua’s human-powered monorail, the Schweeb, Geoffrey Barnett, “combined a laid-back, recumbent bicycle with monorail technology” and came up with the idea while living in Tokyo. Barnett worked on the design for six…
Sculptured Meaning
At Timaru’s Phar Lap Raceway, a bronze statue of the famed Big Red and his regular jockey, Jim Pike takes pride of place. Today, the South Island city is making full use of the…
Thinking Outside the Ball
“As I tumbled down the mountainside in a gigantic beach ball filled with water, feeling somewhat like I was in a washing machine, it occurred to me that there had to be…
Queenstown’s Quiet Side
The Sydney Morning Herald’s Sarah Maguire visits “adrenalin-central”, but goes against-the-grain with a laid-back luxurious holiday. “Being a full-time working mother puts adrenalin into the system daily, so I don’t need that…
Delightfully Relaxing
On board Russell’s new 46m-long catamaran Ipipiri, which offers overnight cruises around the Bay of Islands, The Sydney Morning Herald’s Rob McFarland learns about the town’s colourful past. “If you’d visited the…
On the anchor stone
“There’s a flock of noisy kakas on my front lawn, quarrelling over some croissants left over from breakfast,” describes The Independent’s Kathy Marks, holidaying on Stewart Island, “a place so remote that…
Perfect with Pimms
Worchester Street in Christchurch is the feature promenade in The Age’s ‘Street Smart’ travel section. Christchurch is a walking city and Worcester Street one of its loveliest promenades. Stretching from Canterbury Museum and the…
Bent to Every Whim
“The beauty of train journeys is that you can appreciate the dominance of New Zealand’s landscape over its inhabitants,” writes The Independent’s Dan Poole post-Tranz Scenic trip down through both islands. “Over…
Barrier Time
“You won’t find street lights, an ATM or a bank on the Barrier,” a local tells Los Angeles Times reporter Rosemary Macclure. “But we do have two stop signs.” They also have a place…
Luxury Lodge World’s Best
Rotorua’s luxury Lake Okareka Lodge has been voted the world’s best luxury country lodge at the Luxury Hotel Awards held in Thailand. The five-year-old lodge has three double bedrooms, each with bathroom en suite,…
Perfectly Picturesque
New Zealand’s “countryside is stunning (no wonder The Lord of the Rings was filmed there); the people are charming — like happy Britons; and the food and drink can be memorable,” writes Oxford University…
Defining Experience
“The New Zealand lodge is almost a travel genre in its own right; and, like the safari lodge, the ranch and the spa resort, it comes with a set of defining experiences,” writes Max…
Picking Up the Protocol
“New Zealand may be best known for adventure tourism including sky diving, bungee jumping, gliding and ‘Zorbing’ ó rolling downhill in a 10-foot-tall inflatable sphere cushioned with water.” Yet the most enriching part of…
Slink Into Style
The Wairarapa’s Wharekauhau Lodge & Country Estate is one of five “sexy and stylish retreats” recommended by the Observer’s Mr and Mrs Smith who travel throughout New Zealand and Australia looking at the best….
Ski Season Success
New Zealand’s 2009 winter ski season was the best it has ever been with 1.5 million sets of skis and snowboards hitting the slopes, including over 100,000 skiers from across the Tasman. New Zealand…
Welcoming business nous
New Zealand’s migration policy has been relaxed in an effort to allow potential investors and entrepreneurs to gain permanent residency. Currently the majority of Brits hoping to live permanently in New Zealand must have…
