Of my 12 month travel time line for my around the world trip, I had set aside about 5 weeks for New Zealand. 5 weeks on paper looks like plenty of time to explore NZ’s two islands, which are equivalent in size to the state of Colorado in the USA.

Yet, the final division was not 2.5 weeks in each. It was 4.5 weeks South Island; 0.5 weeks North Island. And of that 0.5 week, I probably spent 50% of that time on the bus making my way north to Auckland.

The South Island was nice that I wanted more time there, helped in part with my endless free accommodation in Dunedin, but it came at the cost of missing out on the North Island.

Day #1: Bus to North Island

After an early morning wakeup to catch a 7am bus to the ferry, I was rewarded with a sunrise over the plains of Canterbury that was so pretty that I felt too guilty to go back to sleep.

Sorry, please forgive the shaky bus photo. You get the idea.

Other highlights of this part of the bus journey included the shoreline drive along the coast to Kaikoura.

Kaikoura, South Island, NZ

At Picton, I boarded the Cook Strait ferry. This is noted as one of the prettiest ferry rides in the world. The first hour is spent winding out of the Marlborough Sounds (wine country, where some of the trees were red) to the strait where you can see the coasts of both the North and South Islands at the same time. Then another hour coming around the point into Wellington Harbour.

Day #2-3: Wellington

Wellington is the capital of NZ and had lots to offer the curious tourist. I took the cable car up to the Botanic Gardens and then wandered/were slightly lost around town near and on Cuba St (the “latin” quarter – mostly trendy shopping and cafes) and the waterfront.

Next day was the massive Museum, with a capital M, Te Papa. It was enormous – six floors of interactive exhibits. You could spend hours in there. Coolest thing I saw: preserved giant squid on display. There was also a high tech floor map of NZ where if you step on a square, pictures of the area would appear on the walls in the room. Before I knew it, I’d been in there for three and a half hours. I also was impressed to see the level of collaboration in the Maori exhibits, since Canadian museums have been slow to address artifact repatriation to First Nations.

Wellington.