2015 September, we took a trip to New Zealand. We tour the
North Island first then follow by South Island. The whole trip took about 3
weeks. When I did the pre trip research, I realized that people can travel one
big round on both islands with the same period as us. Personally I feel pretty
tired if follow their itinerary as you spend a lot of time on driving.
To let I and my wife have enough rest and fully discharge
after the trip, we stayed at every town at least 3 nights. We have not gone to
northern and southern part of North Island. We have not gone to west coast of
South Island. However, we rather cut down the attractions in order to have
quality travel.
New Zealand includes 2 main islands, it is located near to
Australia but smaller than Australia. The land area is 270,000 kilometer
square, it has almost same population as our country – Singapore. But Singapore
land area just only 780 kilometer square. So it is different experience as we
hardly see crowded shopping mall, public transport, etc. It was great. Its
climate likes Australia, with four seasons. September is their Spring, range 0
to 19 degrees C, see which town you are in.
Singapore Airline and Air New Zealand have direct flight to
New Zealand main cities. Quantas and Emirates will need to transit in
Australia. In term of cost, indirect flight is cheaper but difference not huge.
So we bought Air New Zealand, just have a try on this Airline. After the trip,
we still prefer Singapore Airline as the service and food both are better than
Air New Zealand.
The flight brought us to Auckland. In order to search for
good food, attraction, use maps for driving, we bought a New Zealand prepaid
phone card. The best coverage is company
call Spark, with basic package NZD29, you have sms, phone service and 500 MB
data. Add-on NZD19, with extra 1.5GB. Total 2 GB, that is more than enough for
our 3 weeks trip. Download its apps, you can track your usage and top-up by
credit card, very convenience. Below are the links.
In Auckland, we live in the north, about 30 minutes by bus
to city. Personally, I like to have different experience during travel. Stay
like local, eat like local, walk like local, these are my travel objective. We
stayed at local resident areas, here the photos.
We stay at Hillcrest area, the price about
NZD100 per night, found it from airbnb.
Before collect car from rental company, we used public
transport for few days. Bought an AT Hop card, download its apps to check bus
route, arrival time. You will have no problem to explore Auckland.
Let’s have a look on their resident houses.
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