New Zealand

[mngo]

wyy
wow!! I swear i must go again. my first trip there... i spend on day at rotorua. so no time for spa. my 2nd time there, i pregnant. also cannot do hotspring. tats why i chose QE for a simple mud bath lor.

in deed i also love rotorua..... the hotspring and all. in my 2004 trip when i was preg, the motel i stay got a private hot spring in the bathroom and my mil enjoyed the spring so much.

wah so nice ugot the private pool.. but cost a bit right? did u try the public pool?

for bay of islands, is nice... cos right at the light house u see the 2 merger of oceans. one is tasman sea, the other is the pacific ocean. very awesome!!!

if i go to north again, i HAVE to go to polynesian spa to do a treatment. did you have to make appointment in advance before you reach rotorua?

yea.. shopping is horrible

. hehehe worst than melbourne

 

[wyy]

i did not make any appt with poly spa....but private pool only cost $12 per pax for 30min (if i did not remember wrongly cos HB paid; will chk and let u know again). When I was in rotoura, i stayed in Kiwi Paka YHA hostal which is quite far from town. I onli manage to go spa when a friend who is staying in rotoura drove us there after a meal at chopstick.By the time we are at Poly all the therpist has gone home.

think if going there, you can buy a yabba card then call Poly to make reservation cos think the service for any treatment ends at 9pm or so.

Public pool i think cost not much lesser. abt $8 or $10.....but you can try all the pools of different temp.....

Bay of island....i will chk with my agent (which is my HB's uncle) when i wanted to go NZ again. He will arrange the whole trip for us...which he did very well for our Honeymoon trip which just ended.

 

[am_blessed]

Hi all,
waa...didn't realize that this thread is moving again ^_^

Babe,
Have u come back from your NZ trip? How was it??

 

[mngo]

wyy
wah... i feel so much like going again!!!! i tot after 2 visits to NZ , i am sick and tired. but thinking of the hot spring.. wahhh... haha

will u be going to south island? the scenery is awesome!

 

[mngo]

am blessed
yea... i tot this thread was so dead

 

[babywong]

Heh Heh,

Sorry ladies. Been busy since I came back less than 2 weeks ago.. Hah so coincident tat today is the first day checking up on the forum n u gals are oreadi asking for me. Guess must have heard u gals scolding me... hee hee

Wow, south island was real beautiful. We spent less than $7.5K in total for both of us inclusive of airfare, accomodations n etc. I was lucky tat though I din book any accomodation in advance, we are able to get some quite nice accomodations.. Weather was nice too.. cold in some areas n hot in queenstown.. Tried the shotover but seriously it wasnt worth much of a try... Deer Park Heights was nice n we went whale watching at Kaikoura via a small flight.. All n all, nice n easy place to travel around.

 

[am_blessed]

hurrayy...babe is back!

woww..7.5K! That's...a lot! Heehee.. I only give 6K budget for 13D/11N (it includes airfare -_-o) Did u splendour on nice foods at restaurant or was it your accommodations that r expensive? oh it's hot in queenstown..i wonder will it be hotter during summer (i.e. Dec-January).

Babe, pls share ur photos if u dun mind. i wanna see the things i will be seeing end of this year...haha. my email is [email protected]

Thanks ^_^

 

[happi]

Hey, i wanna share ur nice nz pics too....
[email protected]

thanks

 

[babywong]

Ayai Have yet to upload leh.. Took quite a lot of photos.. hee hee.. coz I bring laptop so every nite download fr memory card to laptop, so take everything..

Oh I dun cook. So most of the times we eat at restaurants n sometimes take away. My accomodations are mainly motels, average should be NZ$100 beside. Actually we will spent more $$, if not for the bad weather such tat we cant take hot air balloon or helicopter or play water rafting.

 

[mngo]

babewong
i also want to see your photos... maybe we can exchange. send to [email protected]

 

[wyy]

mngo,
yeah...thinking of south ....but since my tour agent is my hubby's uncle, i will let him do the planning.....

Babewong,
i want your pic too
[email protected]

 

[babywong]

Will do, will do... Pls give me some time.. I will email u gals once all the photos are uploaded..

Generally, the scenary is beautiful , breathtaking at some point, though at the end of our trip, we feel sian watching the mountains, lakes n river.

People are friendly. Actually u only get to see people when in towns / city. While on the road, u hardly see any. Mostly cows and sheeps. All my relatives who saw my photos commented why all the photos only 2 of us. Coz there arent many tourists and people there.

Roads are easy to drive around even for me who just pass my driving license less than 3 months ago, I was driving at 100KM / Hr coz not much cars and I choose those straight straight roads lah.. The rest winding ones all left to my husband to drive n he actually enjoys it, as he felt like playing Daetona like tat.

Weather was sometimes cold, sometimes hot depending on where ( i.e. seaside or land) and whether got sun or not.

Food was generally western. We bought bread n cereal fr supermarket + some instant noodles (fr Spore) for our breakfast. Lunch mostly takeaway burgers / fish & chips / pizzas. Dinner sometimes restaurants either having the main courses: Fish / Chicken / Beef / Lamb or pasta or pizza + soup. Sometimes we order Chinese Takeaway which only open at night.

 

[mngo]

wyy
is so good tat your hubby's uncle is the tour agent. haiz... for our case we do all by ourself. very xiong man!!

 

[irene_lim]

HI Babe,

Did you follow tour group or u go on F&E? Can you private e-mail me? I got some question to ask you!

cheers

 

[babywong]

Hi Irene,

I did my ow F&E. Plan everything myself. Research using information from this forum and from the internet. Well I am happy to answer any of yr questions if I can. I dun have yr email. Maybe u can PM me instead?

 

[babywong]

Hee sorry. I think my profile dun allow me to receive any PM. Y dun u email me at this address:
[email protected] if u have any queries?

 

[mngo]

posting some of my NZ photos... north island.

Te Apiti windfarm at Masterton

Napier

Napier

Napier

Taupo

Taupo - Sakura!

Huka Falls

Rotorua

Wai O Tapu - Champagne pool

Rotorua (i think!)

Hot water beach

Tauranga

Coromendal

Dolphins

Hole in a rock

Cape Reinger

Keri Keri Stone house

Orewa Beach

 

[wyy]

WOW....NICE....

i think the pic which you indicate "Rotorua (i think!) "....i believe is Napier port.

 

[mngo]

wyy
oh i've checked... the "Rotorua (i think) is actually rotura .. cos i din go napier port..... unless my memory fail me. or my photo date was wrong...

 

[mngo]

next week i post the south island pic...

 

[irene_lim]

hi mngo,

wow... ur pics re beautiful, u manage to capture e rainbows in ur pic. Well done....

cheers

 

[wyy]

Mngo....

i oso want to share some of pic i take

too excited liao

Auckland -Some Church that I pass by

Auckland - Sky City At Night

Champange Pool

Huka Fall

Napier

Napier Sunset

 

[mngo]

Hi Irene...

Hee.. taken by my hubby. when we went during winter, we managed to see lots of rainbows! so excited.

wyy
wah... heh... u also went to napier.. did u visit the pernell fruit orchard? the biggest orchard in NZ. your champagne pool is nice!!

i really thought tat NZ has the best scenery (of cos other than canada)

 

[mngo]

wyy did u go up to sky city? we din...
oh auckland has the ice pub (made of ice one...) , did u try it out?

 

[wyy]

mngo...

isit...i did not know abt the ice pub....but actually not too into pub....but i like the beer "TUI" though...

I went up to sky city with complimentary pass...and oso went to the casino change a $5 complimetary chips but dun know how to bet so we took it back

Napier, we stayed at friend's place....did you see Singapore Resturant there? we stayed at the boss's place (Boss = HB uncle's friend).we not go fruit cos she is not free but she brought us to winery "MISSION"

 

[mngo]

wyy
oh yea.. at napier we saw the singapore restaurant. but then we din have much confidence in the food... thats why i ended up having subway. at the napier city centre, there was a couple selling very nice donut! and it's really hot and soft when we eat it. wah.... the best donut i ever tried.

oh, wellington has a belgian restaurant tat serves good Hoe Garden mussles. their hoe garden is brewed in the restaurant. It's called Luven. twice i went NZ, twice i went to that restaurant. A pot of the mussle is only NZ14/- ... and one pot is 1kg. yummy!! hehehe

Beer TUI?? i din try it... but tat time i went to the lion brewery at auckland. must pay money though....

 

[ma22]

Hi all, just my 2 cents worth.

Been to NZ, South island last month for 2 weeks & my 3.5 yrs old gal loved it !

Fantastic sceneries, nice glacier, lakes, rivers, mountains, sheeps, cows & llama. Should the sheeps gather & have riot all human being will die man ! Can imagine the xx numbers of sheep u'll see along the way

The weather was quite cold and we bought quite a few sweaters & anorak from Kathmandu (having easter sales).

Just like to share my experience with Hertz. We rented a 4 litre, Ford Explorer since there are 5 passengers with 2 big & 2 small luggages. Car space very roomy. Sad part is when we travel above 120km, the steering wheel shakes. Nvrmind. Then in Christchurch, after we drove out to the main road from a shopping mall, the engine suddenly dies off for no reason ! Thus, no brake & no power steering. Poor hubby have to use all his strength to steer the car to the side of the road.

Tried to locate the emergency hotline but no label was displayed in car. After some searching, we found some nos. to call. Best part is, hertz staff at the airport actually told us to drive to the airport to have our car replaced ! She's siao-oh-wat. How to drive 20 mins in a faulty car to the airport ? What if something happen on our way ? Mind u, there are 5 lives in the car leh.

My angry hubby have to argue with them & in the end we waited for 45 mins before they send a replacement car to us. Haiz ..... Waste our time. Anyway, they compensated us with 2 days car rental & we let the matter rest.

Anyway, I would strongly advice :- Never ever stay in ABERDEEN MOTEL, Dunedin. It sucks ! Lousy place & eerrie. All os us have the creepy kind of feeling as if someone is watching us. So pls, a BIG no no.

 

[canon]

Hi maz 22,

Thanks for sharing so much. I'll be leaving for south island on friday fro 2 weeks. Self-drive with hubby.Did you have much problem driving to milfourd sound; as in do you need snow chain?

 

[mngo]

ma22
what an eventful trip you have

 

[do1phin]

hi all,

people like me never seen a flood before.. we were very blur continued to drive fr invervargil to dunedin via catlins. it was raining heavily and huge gusts of wind.rivers are bursting full..at one place (some wulu town),we could not drive forward as teh roads are flooded.. instead of staying put at the nearest wulu town, we drove back (3hrs back) to the invervargil. good thing we did that as the next day's papers reported one of towns where we passed by was flooded to half the height of a house.

on teh same day, reports on dunedin/mosgel/omaru was flooded. highway 1 is closed..sudden snow falls at lindis pass/crown range..queenstown airport closure..

this meant we were stuck at the city because we cant drive via catlins forest nor via queenstowns.

good thing the rainfall has gone down fair abit the following day.highway reopened.. we managed to catch up with the driving journey and board our flight at christchurch

lessons learnt. if u noticed that the rivers are v full, heavy downfall..big gust of wind, turned back to the nearest big city.do not stayed overnight at some wulu town.. (good thing we did not.. else we would be in the flood)

be informed of the weather forecast/news: try to tune in to the radio station or watch their local-news always.

double checked with i-site on the road condition each time we reached the town..

last but not least.. drive slowly during bad weather..

besides the 2 eventful days.. we enjoyed our trip. autumn is v v beatiful. machiam like qiu tian de tong hua

 

[jen_bibi]

Hi dolphin

Poorthing, u must be scared stiff right?
think we went abt the same timing but when i heard about the flooding we were near to ashburton but there also heavy raining.

took tonnes of pics and how working on the $$$ n see just how much did we 'burst' the budget
cos i bought near to $300 plus of scrapbooking accessories.

 

[do1phin]

hi jen,

yeap

make me feel blessed to have "occasional showers over several areas in sg"

hey, we are about the same timing indeed! which other towns did u go?

heard about the scrapbooking stuff.. where did u get yrs??

cheers,

 

[little_a]

Avon River

Church of Good Shepherd, Lake Tekapo

Lake Tekapo

Mount Cook, 1st Swing Bridge

Moerki Boulders

 

[little_a]

Can someone teach me how to upload a bigger image?

 

[little_a]

Sheeps

Larnach Castle, Dunedin

Fence full of shoes...

 

[little_a]

I think this was taken at Florence

Sunset... On the way to Te Anau

Milford Sound

Milford Sound

Waterfall at Milford Sound

 

[little_a]

Shotover Jet, Queenstown

Fence full of bras..

 

[little_a]

will post more pics..

 

[jen_bibi]

Hi dolphin

I got most of my stuffs in christchurch (outskirt), are cheaper abt more than $2 dollars but USA still cheaper.
i got the papers here cos scare i will bend them but there are some accessories in ashburton which i should ve buy them but din (really reget man!!)

i went on the 13th evening till 28th noon (should be quite close right)

places we went to:
1. Christchurch
2. greymouth
3. Westport
4. Charleston
5.Franz Josef
6. Foz Glacier
7. wanaka
8. Queentown & Arrowtown
9. Te Anau
10. Milford Sound
11. Gore
12. Milton
13. Dunedin
14. Kurow
15. Omarama
16. Twizel
17. Mount Cook
18. Lake Tekapo
19 Fairlie
20. Geraldine
21. Ashburton
22. Akaroa
23. Amberley
24. Hanmer Spring
25. Christchurch

Some of the towns we spend abt half day there.

if u gals liked salmon sashimi dun bypass town 16

 

[do1phin]

hi jen,

we went through similar routes except for greymouth.. guess u went tho arthur pass rd.

speaking of salmon, yes indeed!! there are 2 farms...one called mt cook salmon farm.. the other one mt country..xxx one get to pass by it during journey fr twizel to queentown. very fresh. come with ice box if u buy the raw ones.

anyone try driving via crown ranges rd fr wanaka to queenstown? how is it?

cheers,

 

[jen_bibi]

Hi Dolphin

we took e transalpine train. e scener was really very nice.

did u went to both? cos we did, we went to the 1 near to twizel for sashimi right after our breakfast and at the mt cook salmon farm, we bought a fillet (quite big) n cook it for dinner. (very fresh n juicy)

did you try their beef? cheap n very juicy. we bought ours at their supermarket.
that was e best meal we had from our time there

 

[ma22]

Hi Mingles,

Not sure if I'm too late for this reply.

We opt for coach as friends told us that the roads are slippery n abit "shiong" to drive 10 hrs to & fro. Anyway, I have to compliment the coach driver from Kiwi Discovery for his fast n steady driving ! Poor chap have to drive from 6am+ till 8pm+ hor.

Lyesha,

Where r these fence of shoes & bra ? Nvr came across le.

My gal took the Kawaru Jet n she fell asleep half way thru ...... She must have been real tired

P.S For Spa lovers :-
1) Take Apline Pacific Traingle Route to Hanmer Spring Thermal Spa Pool in Hanmer Spring.
2) Take the Alpine Tranverse Route to Muruia Spring Thermal Resort, drive thru Lewis Pass.

Wonderful !

 

[mngo]

Lyesha
that shoes and bra fence seems so familar. i seem to have come across it. but where abt?

photos r good! nice! by the way, what is teh size of your pic now. i normall resize to 300x300

 

[little_a]

mngo,
The fence full of bras is found along the way from Arrowtown to Wanaka...Puzzling World

Heehee.. more photos..
Lake Hawae

Lake Matheson .. Water is not still (must go in the morning)

A replica of Lake Matheson .. Taken from the motel I stayed

 

[do1phin]

hi jen,

yes, its the 2 farms that u mentioned. i bought a big fish while passing by the mt cook one..it last us for 2 days. yummy fresh..

i did not tried beef.. not a beef eater.

hi mingles,
is crown rd range easy to drive?

cheers

 

[mngo]

lyesha
oh yes!! now u remind me.

 

[mngo]

pictures back in 2002

Kawa Kawa Toilet - Upper North Bay of islands

Wellington Night View

Bleinham

Lake Tekapo

Queenstown

University of Otago , Dunedin

Penguins at omaru

Christchurch

 

[sugar_babes_3310]

hi gers,

wondering if anyone here went for self drive in NZ?

am planning to go in Jan for honeymoon, planning to self drive. Any tips to share or where are the nice places to go, cheap n nice motels to stay?

 

[little_a]

Hi sharky_siak,

I have uploaded my itinerary. You may check it out... Self-drive in NZ.
<center><table border=1><tr><td>

Itinerary (2 - 20 Dec 05).doc (43.0 k)</td></tr></table></center>

 

[jen_bibi]

HI Lyesha

Your itinerary very rush leh.

there are alot of forest walks (15mins to 4hrs) along all those places you are going too. they are quite nice so you may want to keep some optional places where you may not keen to go so you can enjoy them.

Hi tanna_bee

where you thinking to go, there are some quite affortable (what is your price range?).
Jan is near to peak period right? if so most of your accommodation have to be pre-book or you may risk paying very high price just to sleep 1 night.