AboutNatia > Travel Logs > New Zealand
Welcome to New Zealand,
the place that kiwis call home!
New Zealand is known for its adventurous and sometimes crazy outlook on adrenaline -- after all New Zealanders invented Zorbing. Kiwis are very friendly easy-going people with slightly different / shorter accents than the Australians. Plus it was surprising to see that while Auckland's latitude pretty close to that of Sydney, it is a much cooler place as the winds from Antartica hit New Zealand first before going to Australia.
CITIES/PLACES VISITED IN NEW ZEALAND : Auckland, Rotorua.
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TOP THINGS TO DO/SEE IN NEW ZEALAND
- Visit Rotorua for tons of cultural, geo-thermal and adrenaline activities (3-4 hours from Auckland)
- Waitomo Cave and Glow Worm Tours
- Wander along the hip shops and cafes of Auckland's Ponsonby Road
BEST MEMORIES FROM NEW ZEALAND
- Tasting the Feijoa fruit (pronounced Fee-joh-ah) - eaten like a kiwi fruit, it has an amazing aroma and flavour
- Seeing steaming water and bubbling mud at the Wai-o-Tapu thermal wonderland near Rotorua
- Maori village cultural experience, show and feast (near Rotorua)
- Trying not to giggle when the Maori stuck their tongues out and made faces at us during a traditional maori show
FAVOURITE FOODS / DRINKS IN AUSTRALIA
- The Brie Explosion from New Zealand's gourmet burger chain Burger Fuel... don't forget to ask for a "doofer", which prevents the burger from dripping all over you.
- Feijoa fruit (pronounced Fee-joh-ah) - eaten like a kiwi fruit, it has an amazing aroma and flavour
- Kumara Potatoes - Basically New Zealand's sweet potatoes. Delicious as fries or in a mash.
- New Zealand Rose Apples - juicy and tart, but not like green apples at all
REALLY WEIRD FOOD / DRINKS
GREAT SOUVENIRS
- A beautiful dark green jade ring. There were also tons of pendants and earrings available, formed in beautiful indigineous/maori shapes and offered in both jade and cow bone.
PHOTO ALBUMS
Auckland (20)
New Zealand
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Rotorua (21)
New Zealand
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WHERE I WOULD GO IF/WHEN I WENT BACK
- Southern New Zealand for its great mountainscapes, snowboarding and fjords
- Rotorua : Try my hand at skydiving, zorb (with water), freefall extreme body flying at the agrodome(mock-skydiving), shweeb racing, polynesian spa / hell gate waiora spa (mud spa), sheep shearing at the agrodome
- Auckland : Auckland Zoo's Zoom at the Zoo (Interaction with animals), check out mission bay and Kelly Tarlton's underwater world
- Tree Adventures
- Scuba Diving on Poor Knights Islands
- Waitomo Glow Worm experience and black water rafting