“I have some bad news, I can’t drive…” Jie’s words hung in the air as Mei listened worriedly over the phone. Jie’s U.S. driver’s license had expired and the new one she applied for in China wouldn’t be ready in time for our New Zealand family road trip. After a tense family Skype conference later that evening, it was decided that Dad would try to do most of the driving, and Jie would help if he became tired.
And so, we embarked on another epic family trip that would be filled with majestic scenery, a lot of road kill, and great teamwork that helped us navigate an unforgettable 10-day road trip across New Zealand.
Day 1: Arrival to Auckland
After a long flight from KL to Auckland on Malaysian Airlines, we were greeted by our cousin’s husband, Ed who picked us up from the airport. Our first stop was to check into a no-frills budget airport hotel to put down our suitcases before heading over to our cousin, Helen’s flower shop. We had heard about her flower business and were very curious to see the actual store! On the way, we stopped by One Tree Hill, a volcanic peak in Auckland which ironically did not have a tree on the hill, but had an obelisk instead. It was extremely windy, and Mei was afraid she would be blown away! After a quick tour, we headed back inside the car to drive to the mall where Helen’s flower shop was located. She gave us a wonderfully warm reception and showed us her beautiful floral arrangements.
We then set off together for their house in Eastern Bay, which was warm and cozy and were treated to a delicious home-cooked vegan meal of quinoa-based pizza, roasted vegetables, cashew-based mushroom soup and chocolate fudge for dessert made from raw cocoa and coconut oil. Fun fact: Helen’s entire family is vegan but their two kids are the tallest people among all of our relatives! After dinner, we walked down the slope from their house to visit beach. Another fun fact: Kiwis don’t like to wear shoes! Our cousin’s kids both left the house barefoot and it was totally normal. It was low tide, so we were able to walk really far into the wet sand without reaching the water. The whole area was very serene and peaceful and we could see why they decided to settle there.
Day 2: Flight to Queenstown
We took an early flight from Auckland to Queenstown on Jetstar and the first order of action was to get SIM cards for everyone! We realized that most hotels in New Zealand charge for wifi, and free wifi isn’t as widespread in public spaces like the rest of Asia, so we were feeling slightly removed without regular access to e-mail and Google Maps. Luckily, there was a Vodaphone store at the airport, so Jie, Mei and Dad lined up to purchase data for the trip. We then picked up our rental car from Hertz and drove into Queenstown. The weather was amazing – bright, cheerful and pristine, reminding us of Canada. After parking the car at the Millennium Hotel, we decided to walk around the city centre, which really reminded us of a few vacation towns we stopped by during our Canada trip. We wandered into the activity centre, where a large “Bungee Jumping” sign was displayed. Jie’s eyes lit up with excitement and she announced that “we have to do this!” Dad was equally, if not more enthusiastic, and we spent several moments posing for pictures with the sample bungee jumping ropes hanging from the ceiling.
However, when it came time to actually sign up for the jump, apprehension set in and we encountered a few seconds of hesitation. We finally decided to sign up for the jump off the ‘Ledge’, which took place at the top of a mountain peak, because we were heading up there the next day anyways. Feeling slightly spooked at the thought of jumping the next day, we decided to turn our minds toward exploring the surrounding area and spent the rest of the afternoon by a lake, where Jie managed to climb up a tree. We ended the day with a relaxing dinner next to the water, where we ordered some delicious New Zealand blue-lipped mussels.
Day 3: Bungee Jumping!
We woke up with anticipation (and a bit of dread) for an action-packed day! We started off with a standard cooked New Zealand hotel breakfast of scrambled eggs, sautéed mushrooms, beans, grilled tomatoes with yogurt, muesli, fruit, toast and copious amounts of coffee. The first activity was the Shotover Jet ride, which is essentially a powerful raft that can glide on the water at high speeds and then do 360 turns every so often, eliciting a lot of giggles from the passengers. A bus took us from the city centre to the water bank, where we got on the Shotover jet and then proceeded to shoot down the river for about 30 minutes, with a couple of fun swerves and close calls weaved in. There must have been too much jostling, because Mom’s tooth became loose during the ride and eventually fell out!
After heading back to the town centre, Mei decided that she wanted to try the famous Fergburger, which is a burger store that only has one location in Queenstown, with lines out the door the whole day. Being Asian, we had to see what the hype was about! After waiting in line for about 30 minutes, we finally picked up our order, which included 3 massive burgers: one was a Middle Eastern burger with falafel balls inside, the other was an Asian spiced tofu burger and the last one was a classic Fergburger. All three were enormous and pretty delicious although we’re not sure if we would stand in line for them again. Mei was also intrigued by the Ferg Bakery next door which sold delicious-looking pastries. But alas, her eyes are bigger than her stomach. Maybe next time…
Finally, after lunch, it was time for the heart stopping climax – bungee jumping! We rode the gondola up to Bob’s peak and then reported to the Bungee Jumping station where the attendant took our weight and made us sign disclaimer forms, essentially signing our lives away. Mei decided she would jump first as she isn’t very scared of heights. However, as both of us approached the “Ledge” which was essentially a makeshift cabin hanging off the slide of a cliff overlooking shimmering blue lake water, a gradual feeling of uneasiness started to sink in. Someone helped to buckle Mei in, and in what appeared to be no time, she was waiting at the edge of the cabin, listening to instructions on how to jump and how to get back up. By then, the only thoughts in her head were “it’s too late to back out” and “oh my god, what have I done?” Indeed, it was too late, and after re-assuring herself that it would all be over in a few seconds, shoved any other thoughts out of her mind and plunged… the only way to describe the sensation was a heighted explosion of panic during the free fall, followed by a huge feeling of relief when the rope tightened, culminating with triumphant, but shaky thoughts of “I did it, now get me back up and out of here!!”. It was definitely an experience of a lifetime and a lesson in overcoming fears! After Mei arrived safely back at the cabin, it was Jie’s turn. Jie has a fear of heights, so it took a massive amount of energy and bravery for her to release the railing she was holding onto at the edge of the cabin (she was reminded by the attendant that, no, you can’t take that with you – sorry), but she did a magnificent job jumping! Mom and Dad took some great photos and videos of both of us. We definitely seem like amateurs compared to the air gymnastics that other people executed, but we are super proud of ourselves and will never forget this once-in-a-lifetime experience.
Day 4: Milford Sound
We had heard about the beauty of Milford Sound, which is a fjord in the Southwest of New Zealand’s South Island within Fjiordland National Park and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Since it was quite a long drive away, we scheduled a tour bus to pick us up from our hotel for the cruise. On our way, we stopped by a few scenic viewing spots and spotted a Kea, an intelligent species of the parrot, which can create trouble by damaging the rubber tires of cars.
We had lunch on the cruise, and although it was pretty, we didn’t think it was spectacularly different from some of the other places we had been to, including Halong Bay in Vietnam and the fjords in Norway.
After the long bus ride back to Queenstwon, we took out some of the food we had packed from breakfast earlier in the day, and set up a picnic in the garden courtyard of our hotel for dinner. There was a wonderful breeze and we enjoyed taking in the beautiful scenery and fresh air. Poor Jie had to breathe extra clean air to compensate for the pollution in China!
Day 5: Lake Tekapo
We left Queenstown and moved on toward Mt. Cook and Lake Tekapo. Jie and Dad took turns driving, while Mei navigated. Mei found a salmon farm nearby, so excitedly asked to stop there for lunch. The salmon farm had a café, where they served platters of smoked and raw salmon as well as salmon chowder, salmon sushi and miso soup. It was an odd combination of western and Japanese food, but we were hungry! The highlight ended up being the salmon platter, but the sushi Dad ordered turned out to be quite inedible. It was fun nonetheless visiting a real salmon farm.
On our way to Mt. Cook, we passed by a dazzling blue-green body of water.
New Zealand seems to be filled with stunning natural scenery in every other direction you look! After another hour of driving, we ended up at Mt. Cook and did a short hike through some fields.
There wasn’t much to see, so we continued driving to Lake Tekapo and arrived at the Peppers Blue Water Resort, which was directly facing the lake. On the way there, Jie drove slightly too close to the curb and made a tiny scratch on the car. She was worried that we would have to pay a fine, but it ended up being ok. We had our Christmas Eve dinner at a Thai-Korean fusion restaurant in the town centre across from the resort. Apart from the pad thai noodles, nothing else was very good or memorable. A key takeaway: when in New Zealand, eat Kiwi food!
After dinner, we went to see the beautiful lupines by the lake. Lupines only bloom in November/December and their purple and pink flowers provide a gorgeous contrast to the lake. We saw a couple getting their engagement photos at a spot, and proceeded to use that spot for our own family shots!
Day 6: Christchurch
After another standard New Zealand cooked breakfast, we stopped by Lake Tekapo once again and visited the Church of Good Shepherd, which is an iconic church overlooking the lake.
The lake reminded us of Lake Victoria in Canada, and so of course we had to replicate the yoga poses which we had also done there.
After some amusing yoga stretches, we headed off to Christchurch, which is still in the stages of being rebuilt after the earthquake that destroyed parts of the city in 2011. On the way there, we stopped at a rest station to eat some of the snacks we had bought the day before for lunch. Although most of the places in Christchurch were closed, we were able to visit the Botanic Gardens which housed a rose garden filled with gorgeous bunches of every type of rose imaginable in full bloom!
We also stopped by the “Re-start” mall, where different stores and cafés were set up inside industrial container boxes. Unfortunately, everything was closed, so we could only admire from outside the store windows.
Christmas dinner was at the Ibis Christchurch hotel restaurant since nothing else was open, and they provided cute hats for everyone to wear as part of the celebration.
Day 7: Kaikoura
At breakfast, Mom informed us that Dad did not sleep well again and was having second thoughts about driving 3 hours to Kaikoura for the whale watch cruise. We think he was experiencing anxiety from having to drive long distances on unfamiliar roads. We decided that Jie would drive most of the way from Christchurch to Kaikoura. Jie did a marvellous job! After arriving at Kaikoura, we had lunch at the café inside the Whale Watching station before boarding the cruise. On-board, we were given instructions on what to do if anyone felt seasick, so we were all a bit nervous about getting sick by going so far out to the ocean. Luckily, the ship was robust and windows were shut most of the time preventing the wind from blowing inside, so it was a pretty smooth ride – Dad even fell asleep! We saw three or four different sperm whales, but none of them came up to the surface for very long.
Fun fact: Sperm whales eat sharks by swallowing them whole. The real highlight was seeing the dolphins, which swam playfully near our boat. On our way back, Jie took the driver’s seat again. We didn’t get a chance to fill up our gas in Kaikoura, so decided to take our chances in finding a gas station at the next town – unbeknownst to us, New Zealand has roads that go on for long stretches at a time with no towns or gas stations in sight! As the gas tank needle flickered toward the empty mark, Dad started getting anxious, while Jie nonchalantly reassured everyone that she had driven over 20 minutes in Ohio with an empty tank. Luckily, before the tank ran out, we arrived at a town with a few gas stations and everyone was able to breathe a sigh of relief. After getting back to Christchurch, we found a cozy Italian restaurant a few blocks away from our hotel and had an enjoyable dinner of pizza and pasta.
Day 8: Auckland
We returned our rental car at the Christchurch airport and flew back to Auckland. We took it easy and walked up and down the main streets of Auckland city, which reminded us of Sydney. We also ate fancy ice cream at GiaPo, which Mei found of course. Mei ordered the hazelnut ice cream and Jie ordered the lemon sorbet. The ice cream was specially prepared by ice cream “artists” who decorated each scoop with different dustings and toppings.
Later that evening, we had dinner at a Turkish restaurant called Café Midnight Express on Victoria Street near our hotel. Our favourite part of the day and maybe even our favourite part of the trip was listening to our parents tell us about their experience in the Middle East during dinner. Dad had some good stories about the construction projects he had to rescue and his role as a “trouble-shooter” in the Middle East. The key take away is that our parents had a lot of valuable and challenging experiences which has made them much wiser and open-minded. They then passed that down to us. We are two lucky girls!
Day 9: Coromandel Beach
We decided to meet up with Helen’s family again since they were free and could show us around. We met bright and early, and started off by hinting for a GPS since Hertz had ran out of them, but after unsuccessfully knocking on a few doors at different places, realized that Helen’s family had one which we could borrow! Problem solved immediately and we headed off to Coromandel beach, a 2-hour drive away from Auckland, which is famous for Cathedral Cove, the setting of the Chronicles of Narnia movie. We took a walk around the beach, went snorkelling, and Jie also jumped off a 10 m rock, conquering her fear of heights once again!
Our cousins then took us to another beach called New Chums to see the sunset. To access it, we had to navigate over rocks, climb across a stream and then hike up a steep hill. Given that we had 60+ year olds in our group, this was no easy feat. However, the view at the top of the hill was stunning and the evening glow during “golden hour” gave us a breath-taking view of the beach.
Strong teamwork helped us get everyone back down the hill and into the car in one piece before the sun set and high tide set in, which would have made it extremely difficult to cross the stream again. Unfortunately, our cousin’s kid’s planning did not take eating dinner into consideration – by the time we finished hiking, it was 9 pm and all of the restaurants in the area were already closed. Everyone was starving, but since we were with a vegan family, ended up stopping by a McDonald’s drive-through at 11 pm to order ten apple pies for everyone to eat. It was hilarious to see a whole family getting so excited about Mcdonald’s apple pies!
Day 10: Waitomo and Farm Stay
Dad finally had a great night’s sleep after being completely exhausted from the hike the day before. We drove to Waitomo to see the gloworms, which was a unique experience, because the worms were inside a cave and we had to take a raft to glide through the water inside the cave.
We then drove to where we had booked a farm stay hosted by Dean and Margaret near Rotorua. Their profile said that they liked entertaining, cooking and gardening. Both have full time jobs but maintain the farm as a side business. We learned is that maintaining a farm is hard work. A sheep needs to be sheered and have their toe nails clipped or else their feet rot due to ingrown toenails. They also had a goat called Billy, who believed he was a human because he had been raised by Margaret, so didn’t get along with the other goats.
We were impressed by how comfortable the couple was with their current set-up, but also open minded and curious enough to learn about the outside world by hosting people from all over. Dean and Margaret barbequed some vegetables and meats for dinner, and also prepared some wine and cheese for us to enjoy in their front yard. The highlight for us was a container of zucchini chutney which was so good, we vowed to find it in the supermarket to bring back home.
Day 11: Rotorua “Rotten egg smells all around”
Dean and Margaret served a home-cooked breakfast for us with the eggs we had picked the day before. The eggs had vivid, orange yolks which you only typically see from freshly laid eggs. Both of them were also kind enough to provide some additional advice on where to go. We left the farm and set off for Hell’s Gate in Rotorua, where we booked a mud spa package, which included a tour of the geothermal geysers as well as a mud bath in volcanic mud which is supposed to have healing properties. The entire town smelled like sulphur and it took several days for us to get the odour out of our clothes.
We were then informed by our travel agency that Dad had accidentally left his watch at the farm, but nobody was home, so we swung by Hamurana springs first, which was a place recommended by Dean and Margaret. It was a pleasant walk through the Redwood forest and we approached a crystal clear stream where people could throw pennies down and see it literally “dance” due to the emerging water from the bottom of the spring.
We then picked up Dad’s watch after Margaret arrived home and had lunch at a cute, retro-looking place called Okere Falls Store nearby, which had a variety of healthy and vegan food options.
On our way to our hotel, we stopped by a large Pick ‘n Save which is essentially like a Walmart and found the zucchini chutney that we had at the farm the day before! We also picked up a few other dips and souvenirs to bring back. At night, we went to the Maori village, which included a tour of the geysers, a Maori dancing show as well as a traditional feast with grilled and smoked vegetables and meats prepared in a traditional hangi.
Our last ‘activity-filled’ day was saved for Hobbiton! We drove from our hotel in Rotorua to Matamata where we embarked on a guided tour of Hobbiton, the set from Lord of the Rings.
Although we were told not to wander inside, Jie snuck into a Hobbit hole for a photo and managed to see a few things like an umbrella and a miniature chair inside! Mei was so utterly jealous.
All of us loved the set, which was recreated with such attention to detail, you could imagine hobbits waking up and coming outside at any moment. There were even little jars of jam and slabs of cheese set out on the tables outside their homes, as well as hobbit clothes being hung up to dry.
Helen’s family met up with us for lunch after our tour, and we went to visit the Blue Springs together, which is one of the largest sources of natural spring water in New Zealand.
After our hike, we picked up some ice cream from a van by the entrance of the springs, and it was one of the richest, creamiest and most delicious ice creams we’ve ever tasted. We also “kidnapped” our cousin’s son to help drive our car since all of us were tired of driving and navigating. After arriving back in Auckland, we had group dinner at a Malaysian restaurant with Ed’s mother who just arrived from Taiwan. Dad also got in touch with his old classmates who live in Auckland, so we dropped him off at his friend’s house in the evening to spend some private time with them. For New Year’s Eve, we drove to the West end of Auckland where it is more sparsely populated, and lit fireworks on the beach at midnight. It felt magical to be one of the first people to enter the new year and to release our own fireworks together with family that we love. It was a great way to usher in 2016!
Day 13: Hanging out with Dad’s friends
This was the last day in New Zealand and the first rainy day that we encountered. We met up with dad’s old classmates from Asia Institute of Technology (AIT) in Thailand and visited their house, had dim sum at a Chinese restaurant, and passed the afternoon at a museum and an indoor botanic garden because of the rainy weather. Dad had spent the night before at his friend’s house catching up. It was fun listening to stories of their time in Thailand. Apparently, dad cooked noodles on a regular basis for them late at night after studying, which all of them still remember to this date. However, we’ve never had his “famous” noodles. One day we hope… After a day of stories and catching up, we took a 10-hour flight back to Malaysia, bringing home many memories to keep for years to come.
Key Take-Aways
- We’ve never seen such clean public toilets outside of Japan and there is always toilet paper. Out of all the public bathrooms on this trip and it was a100% flush and toilet paper success rate.
- There are definitely more sheep than humans in this country.
- Farm animals need a lot more taking care of than they seem (old sheep can get ingrown toe nails that cause their feet to rot if they don't get them trimmed regularly)
- Roosters start crowing at 4 am, not at sunrise!
- Police officers (and everyone we met in general) are super nice and relaxed. The most common words we heard were "sweet" and "no worries"
- An incredible amount of breath-taking scenery is just a short drive away. Many of them have zero tourists! The scenery changes dramatically from east to west and from north to south.
- The people are very laid back and wouldn’t hesitate to stop and say hi. The most common words were sweet and no worries. Seriously, what is there to worry about in this world? A good indication of this is the kiwi birds. Because there are no natural predators, they stopped growing wings. Also, New Zealander’s like to go barefoot.
- There’s a lot of road kill.
- Tim tams are good and vegemite is strange.
- New Zealanders are quite entrepreneurial and into doing it yourself.
- Asian food is not the best in New Zealand.
