[Closed] NZ / Australia cycle touring advice?

Depends where you are in New Zealand - it't not so much the drivers as the poor roads infrastructure (low population density).

For example State Highway One, the main artery through both the North and the South island is mostly single carriageway and full of trucks. Smaller trucks then in europe and they will honk if they see you, but still bit scary.

Also keep in mind the small population and large size of the place, it just looks small on maps as it's next to Australia, especially in the South Island. You can be a LONG way from help and a water source.

I spent two weeks touring in the South Island, you won't be talking to yourself ! Kiwis are very very friendly and interested in people and will just come up to you and start asking about you, chatting away. I couldn't sit in a cafe for more than about 10 minutes without making some friends.

The cafes are AWESOME too, best coffee anywhere - OK I am biased - but I have been to lots of places !!

toured there 15 years ago and went back 2 years ago and not that much had changed. As for company, you will have plenty of cyling partners (as it were) while on the road. As for trafic... well the whole population is only about 3 1/2 million ie that of a medium city here like Leicester or something, spread out over an area bigger than UK. You would be very very unlucky if traffic did pose you a problem. Deffinately take ya bike, you would kick yourself big time if ya didnt. Get packing!!

Touring here can be lovely if you pick your spots. I can give you a 1000k loop that will be 50pc off road, just gravel roads so not too rough but stunning scenery. There are a few places organise trips etc just google. Nice time to come as weather generally good. There are a couple of books called peddalers paradise which could come in useful. Feel free to drop me an email if you want more info or a bed in Wellington.

Cheers all. I'm now feeling torn between a DiY tour, or finding a group, but good to know that it's a friendly place. I'd be tempted to bring my own bike anyway as I'm fairly small so most hire bikes are too big.

Thanks for the advice on the 'peddlers paradise' books - just had a quick look and they seem idea for planning a trip. And if NZ has the best coffee anywhere, then my ticket is virtually bought!

As much as i love the place the drivers over here are nuts.Combined with tourists that dont know how to drive and the milk tankers that run twice a day the roads are a bit dodgy.The S.I especially down south would be my pick,the pace is a bit slower and definetly the prettiest part of the country.Stay away from the cities especially Christchurch and Auckland.

My wife and cyled down the West Coast of the South Island together. With not many route options or places to stay we soon got to jnow lots of people who were doing the same thing at the same time.

We posted out rucsacs and walking geat to campsites where we thought would be needed (we phoned the campsites to tell them first). This worked well. However combining walking cycling and beeing on your own would be harder as most walkers were using buses and most cyclists were taking 3 days out to walk. It might work to cycle to Queens town then find walking friends there. Again the walking is often over fixed legs between huts its almost impossible not to get to know people.

I found this via google

http://cycletouring.wetpaint.com/page/Seeking+cycle+touring+buddies

I'm sure a ready made tour would be fine just make sure the tour will be what you want. In general I would say New ealand was the easiest place to travel of anyone I've been. However some of the organised groups on buses, particularly the more American groups made me feel old ( i was only 28 at the time) there was quite alot of drinking and "fun" and not really having a clue where you were.

If you have any specific questions about hikes (tramps) or cycling then post again

Its hard to imagine that there isn't a forum somewhere linking up people travelling round New Zealand

I found this through google

http://cycletouring.wetpaint.com/page/Seeking+cycle+touring+buddies <

go to nz and buy pedalers paradise

ride round the south island - quieter - avoid statehighways 1 and 2

we cycled from christchurch to invercargill - up the west coast and up to hamilton on the north island

time of our lives

we never felt along way from anything - we only had to carry a max of 4 days food at anyone time and that was purely because we chose not to spend loads at the shop in milford sound (which had very little anyway)

http://terry-and-jayne-cyclenz.blogspot.com/2008_11_01_archive.html

you couldnt pay me to get on ANY tour bus down there ... we purposfully avoided hostels wherre those busses were parked outside ...

was bad enough using the nz version of mega bus ! (they take bikes btw i just cant remember the link !!!! )

Some info here

[url] http://travellingtwo.com/resources/bycountry [/url]