Itinerary
We had four weeks to play with, so after a lot of careful scoping and planning, we came up with the following locations and activities that fit our interests and time constraints. Included below are the locations where we stayed and a brief description of that day's activities.
We decided to break up our trip from Florida with a 28 hour layover in San Francisco. This gave us a chance to eat some quality food and visit Alcatraz (in the rain) before taking the long flight to Australia (~14 hours).
Australia
- Port Douglas - Land Christmas Day in Australia
- Port Douglas - Great Barrier Reef snorkel trip
- Port Douglas - Guided trip into Daintree Rainforest
- Port Douglas - Free day at the beach
- Sydney - First view of the Sydney harbor and Opera House
- Sydney - Sightseeing in Sydney
- Sydney - Bondi to Coogee hike and New Year's Eve in Sydney
- Sydney - Blue Mountains day trip
- Great Ocean Road - Driving the Great Ocean Road
- Melbourne - Driving the coast and back to Melbourne
- Melbourne - A hot day sightseeing in Melbourne and St. Kilda
New Zealand
- Auckland - An evening in Auckland
- Waitomo - Caving and photography in glow worm caves
- Rotorua - A journey to Middle Earth (Hobbiton)
- Tongariro - Travelling the Geothermal Highway
- Tongariro - Hiking the Tongariro Alpine Crossing
- Renwick - From north to south, volcanoes to wine
- Renwick - Wine tour around Marlborough
- Renwick - Whale watching in Kaikoura
- Abel Tasman - Driving to Nelson and Abel Tasman
- Abel Tasman - Kayaking and hiking in Abel Tasman
- Fox Glacier - Driving the West Coast and sunset at Lake Matheson
- Fox Glacier - Tramping on Fox Glacier
- Milford Sound - Driving the West Coast to Milford Sound
- Milford Sound - Kayaking Milford Sound
- Queenstown - The beauty of Queenstown
Tips and Recommendations
Customs
Australia - There is a Visa requirement for US citizens which costs $20. It's a simple, online form called an Electronic Travel Authority. Make sure to complete this before you get to the airport!
New Zealand - US citizens only need an outbound air ticket that leaves within 3 months of landing. If you are the type of traveler who has a flexible schedule and does not always book their return flight home until already at their vacation destination, that strategy won't really work in New Zealand.
Both countries are strict on most food items (fruits, nuts, even prepackaged processed food, etc) entering the country, so its possible your bags may be x-rayed, especially if you declare something. It's probably easiest to just dispose of whatever snacks you brought before exiting the plane. However, we did declare some snack items (like almonds and Pirate's Booty for our planned hikes) and were able to keep them without any issue.
Packing
Depending on where you are choosing to go or layover (i.e. Fiji), the packing list can consist of beach clothes through cold weather gear for use in the mountains. Even if just staying within Australia/New Zealand, the climates can vary greatly from location to location. While it was over 100 degrees F on one of our days in Australia, it dropped to 33 degrees one night in New Zealand. Although you may visit in Southern Hemisphere summer, we found that New Zealand, which is located at roughly a comparable latitude as Wyoming, rarely had temperatures above 75 Fahrenheit and the winds were quite chilly as they came from Antarctica without any barriers.
In addition, many of the airlines are very strict on weight, with checked baggage limits of 22 kg (~50 pounds) and carry-on limits of 7 kg (~15 pounds). We did have our carry-on bags weighed once in the Cairns airport.
In the end, we chose to go with a large and medium sized suit case. The medium was packed full, with the large having some space (and weight) free for gifts to come home. Carry-on's were day-pack backpacks, one of which primarily carried our camera equipment. The weight limits were tight on the way home, with each bag being within half a pound of the weight limit. To help, we wore our heaviest shoes and even our jackets onto the flights.
Due to the length of the trip and weight limits, we knew we would need to do laundry at some point. Some of the B&B's will wash and dry clothes as an additional service, which is exactly what we did. We did some guesswork and planned and packed for laundry being done midway through our trip and it worked perfectly.
Intracountry Travel / Planning
Australia
Australia is very large and is best thought of as approximately the size of the contiguous (lower) United States. With this in mind, its important to consider how much flying you may do to see and experience different parts of Australia. Flying from Perth (west coast) to Sydney (east coast) takes 4.5 - 5 hours. Flying from Sydney to Cairns (north east corner) is a 3 hour flight, much like New York City to Miami.
We did not see a need to have a rental car while in any of the major cities. In Melbourne and Sydney, we used public transit to get to various destinations. Even in Port Douglas, we took the airport shuttle to and from our hotel and walked to the beach, marina, and restaurants. However, if you want to explore the countryside (like the Great Ocean Road), you will definitely need to rent a car. The rental process (and rental companies) is the same as in the States, but this led to our first experience ever driving on the
It definitely took us (especially the passenger) a few days to get used to driving on the left side of the road. The driver is not used to cars coming towards him or her so close on the right side of the car, he or she tends to veer left, which gives the passenger a lot of anxiety as they feel the rumble strips and look over the cliff into the ocean. The other major difference is the location of the turn signal vs. windshield wiper; they're backwards. If you see windshield wipers going on a perfectly sunny afternoon, it is probably just another tourist who would like to merge. The windshield wipers/turn signal antidote came up in just about every conversation we had with other tourists. Since so many tourists visit Australia, there were actually signs along the Great Ocean Road reminding drivers which side of the road to drive on.
New Zealand
New Zealand may be small on a map, but it can take a deceptively long time to travel between locations. Many of the roads and highways are one lane each way with a maximum speed limit of 100 kph (~62 mph). Driving time on the South Island can be especially hard to judge, with many winding (mountain) roads, and sometimes only a single road to get from point A to point B.
This may seem obvious, but...New Zealand consists of two large islands that are not connected by a bridge. Your options for traveling between the islands are plane and boat. Ferries run multiple times per day between Wellington and Picton. And these are not your typical commuter ferries. They're more like small cruise ships that include a bar, restaurant, and movie theater. Cruising through the sounds near Picton was really serene and picturesque.
Renting a car in New Zealand is essentially the same as in the States. However, if you plan on driving in both the north and south islands, take note that you cannot take your rental car on the ferry. Instead, you turn your car in on one island and pick up a new rental car on the other island. Same goes for the GPS unit if you rent one.
While we rented your average sedan and stayed in hotels/B&Bs, campervans are all the rage in New Zealand. Think of minivans (or slightly larger) with a mattress and sink instead of the back two rows of seats. They ranged in size from literally a converted minivan to a small RV. They're more rustic than traditional RVs but fancier than tent camping. We heard you can get some pretty good deals on campervans especially if you're willing to "relocate" the van from one town to another for the company.
Another seemingly unique to New Zealand feature were the one lane bridges. Most of the bridges we came across narrowed to one lane so you have to figure out whether you or the oncoming cars have the right way. There will be a sign with two arrows. Find the arrow for the direction you are traveling; if you have the big arrow, you have the right of way, but if you have the small arrow, wait your turn unless you didn't get enough adrenaline rushes in Queenstown and want to play chicken.
No comments:
Post a Comment