New Zealand

After spending the last five weeks in New Zealand it's a good time to reflect on our time spent there.

In 32 days on the road we racked up;

• 5,000km in the campervan,
• 600km by coach,
• 450km by train on the TranzAlpine,
• 250km by ferry on the Cook Straight and at Milford Sound

That's the equivalent distance of London to Chicago as the crow lies. We'll have to plant a tree or two one day (maybe a walnut and hazelnut) in order to pay for our carbon footprint here.

Looking back it was a great decision to extend our stay from the original three weeks to five weeks. If we had just three weeks then the South Island would more than likely been sacrificed or at the least heavily restricted. 

The second major decision we made was to rent a van rather than to buy. Even when we arrived at our hostel in Auckland we weren't sure if we wanted to buy and sell or rent a campervan.  Due to the time frame of five weeks we thought it made more sense to not waste time finding and then subsequently trying to sell without knowing how much time either could take.  We also didn't want to be holed up in a garage for the best part of a week and shelling out more cash if we bought a dodgy motor.  With April being Autumn in New Zealand the market is very much for the buyer, so we may have got a decent deal but would most likely have struggled to find a buyer or get a good price as Winter approaches.  With the rental we were able to get more or less straight out on the road and stay touring the country until the morning of our flight!  Although there is the additional cost of renting, the seasonality played its part for our benefit as were able to get rental rates for around half of their peak price.

We found New Zealand a world away from our travels in South America for many reasons.  One of which was of course the freedom, flexibility and privacy of having our own van.  Many people travel the country by bus and stay in hostels as we had done in South America, but splitting the costs of the van in two made it very economical, (we did even see one group who had taken it to the extreme splitting the costs between six in one van!). 

The sheer amount of information centres, i-sites, free maps and flyers make everything so easy.  Of course the ability to speak the language helps a lot!  The Department of Conservation (DOC) provide well over a hundred different camping sites where you can stay for free or a very small fee.  Of course they are basic in regards to amenities (water from a stream or a tap, and a sometimes smelly long drop toilet), but they are located in some beautiful locations alongside rivers, lakes or forests where you can just pull up and choose your spot.  Without any question the best places we stayed were DOC or their district council equivalents.  Of course we needed the luxuries of the 'holiday parks' every once in a while, (we needed to shower and power up sometimes) but for the same price as a hostel you are usually squeezed into a glorified car park formation.

New Zealand a world away from the rest of.... well the rest of The World, is truly a beautiful country, with an incredibly varied landscape and just as incredibly changeable weather!  Our time here (with our much come-to-loved Marv) was awesome and its a good feeling to leave it knowing we had seen so much of whats on offer knowing that it would be easy to stay for several months.