Following on from fathomer’s thread we are planning a 4 week trip to Australia and New Zealand next Christmas. Probably flying out of Manchester via Singapore and the only definites we have is Melbourne and Sydney to visit relatives. We would like to spend more time in NZ than Aus and also looking for a 2-3 day stopover in Asia both ways with Singapore being one.

Singapore – get the taxi rides from the airport. Oz – Blue Mountains. Then for the last 99% South Island NZ 🙂

Queenstown, Fox Glacier, Arthurs Pass all on SI

If you’re in Queenstown, you must go to http://www.fergburger.com/

Jealous of your travels!

If you’re in Queenstown, you must go to http://www.fergburger.com/

Thanks m0rk cracking website.

Thats alot of traveling for 4 weeks…..

You can’t cover half of one half on NZ in 3 weeks so don’t try else you’ll spend all your time enjoying NZ driving. 😆

Aaaahhhh the Queenstown Fergburger.

Amazing stuff.

Thanks guys, I can only get 4 weeks off work so we’re stuck with that schedule. Would love to take 3 months but it just won’t work.

Go less places would be my advice.

If you have family in oz , see oz , leave nz for another trip.

Honestly even that outline itinerary you describe is going to have you seeing little more than airports

Fly Oz-Queenstown direct and spend your time in and around that area. Fly to Milford Sound. Glenorchy etc. all good. A ssaid before don’t spend your time driving.

See one place really well, accept you’ll miss a lot.

Have to agree about concentrating your visit to do justice to one area. Spent a whole year in Oz and theres still things we missed.

I agree, go less places as you can always go back, Sydney harbour is amazing, fruit bats in the park by the Opera House are cool. I think he best bit for me was driving a 4×4 in the outback along the pin straight never ending roads. It just felt like totally Australia. I wouldn’t rush around places, go slowly and enjoy things. Half of Australia is the culture like getting pissed with the locals in a typical Australian tin shed bar.

I stayed in NZ for a year, I’d recommend something like:

Manchester-> Sydney/Melbourne, See relatives. Then Sydney/Melbourne -> Queenstown/Christchurch. Visit Queenstown, Wanaka, Milford Sound, Dunedin, basically south South Island stuff. Hire a camper? Then return via Melbourne/Sydney to see other relatives.

I came across so many people trying to do the whole of NZ in 3 weeks. They mainly spent their time driving. Instead save the other bits of NZ and the Outback and Coasts of Aus for another time.

E.g. the trip after, fly to Darwin, do Northern National Parks, then down to Alice Springs (not worth hanging around itself IMO though), see Uluru, then fly (or train?) to Melbourne see relatives again. Time after that, Sydney then up the east coast?

They do Helicopter uplift from Queenstown by the way. Plus a whole heap of other adventure stuff, I went down some rapids on a bodyboard, which was interesting…. Each extreme/adventure activity must be celebrated with a different burger from Ferg after completion.

Useful info, thanks. Time to rethink the itinerary, it’s just such a bloody long way to go for 2 trips though.

We are flying out doing exactly this in two weeks today. Incredibly excited.

We are starting in Melbourne for a week, where we’re going to soak up the city aswell as the nearby Islands etc,

Then we’re doing 3 nights in Tazmania as it’s only a short flight away.

Then we are flying to Sydney for a week to do blue mountains, the harbour, etc etc etc (To be honest, we havn’t planned much to do in each location, leaving that until we get there.)

Then we are driving back to Melbs from Sydney over about 8 days – the great ocean road it’s called I think. Staying in various places a long the way visiting the bays and doing dolphin watches & mtb trails etc.

Then two last days in Melbs before going to New Zealand. We land in Auckland and the first week we are going further up North.

The 2nd week we are remaining in and around Auckland. I have a few friends in Auckland right now aswell as my sister, so lots of people to catch up with here.

Then we are flying to Christchurch on the South Island and we’re going to do a bit loop over 3 weeks renting a car. Hitting up some bike parks of course as well as anything else that takes our fancy.

Then back to the north Island to see the stuff more inland that we missed. Renting a car again.

Cannot wait 🙂