Using the Kiwi Experience

The Kiwi experience is a great way to travel New Zealand without the worry of finding transport along the way. The bus journey covers the whole two islands (depending on which route you purchase) and makes sure you stop at all the best bits New Zealand has to offer. They also give you a really handy guide free of charge, that has a description of every place you visit, and things you can do there. It also has interesting facts and ideas of things you can do if you are on a budget, plus a little calendar which you can use to help organise your trip.

Once on the bus, the driver will send round clipboards for you to fill in about how many nights stays you want in one of the compulsory night stops. These are often large cities, and it is up to you how long you stay there, although the drivers will usually recommend an amount of time.

Here is the map that is in the guide. As you can see, the different passes are all colour coded for you to see which bits you want to add on, and the large green circles are the compulsory overnight stops.

With Kiwi experience, you are guaranteed one nights stay in their chosen hostel, which is good as you don't have to worry about booking anything unless you want to stay elsewhere or stay for a longer amount of time. The hostel they choose is usually a Base hostel, or sometimes a special location that is a bit different. You usually spend $30 a night which was slightly expensive, and some people found rooms for cheaper on websites, but often couldn't stay in the same rooms together so it may be better for lone travelers.

The drivers do need days off, so sometimes you may not be able to leave on the day you want, as it is a day where no busses leave or arrive. You can by all means make your own way to somewhere, and rejoin the bus at a later date, however Kiwi Experience asks that you complete the full journey with them, in order for you to reuse the pass again. 

For example, we started our pass at Auckland so we would have to travel back to Auckland with kiwi to use the pass again. Due to lack of time, we flew from Christchurch to Auckland, so if we wanted to use our passes again, we would have to start at Christchurch and complete the rest of the stops back up to Auckland in order to do the whole trip again within a year. This is a nice idea, as it means you can go back and do anything you missed, which is something we would like to do, however after Kaikoura, the places you stop are places you have stopped before.

Adding on locations is possible at all times. Things like the Milford Explorer, the Deep South and The Cape Reinga trip are add ons you can purchase at anytime, should your pass not cover it already. Most of the time the kiwi experience website will have one pass on sale, so it's best to snap it up, and then tailor make your add ons later on in the trip. The process is very easy and the driver will take your payment and explain everything to you.

For example, our pass did not include the day trip to Milford sound, whereas our friend Mark's did, so we just purchased that add on and were able to go the same day as him with no problems.

The final condition of the pass, is that you cannot go back on yourself. Once you have left a location, you cannot go back to the last place with the Kiwi bus, you must make your own way there. After Christchurch, we went to Kaikoura to see the whales, however we had to book a bus back to Christchurch in order to catch a flight, as the kiwi bus was heading back north to Wellington.

As well as a guaranteed night stay with Kiwi, you are also guaranteed the cheapest quotes to do activities, and a guaranteed spot for those as well. This is perfect for people who want to do the exciting yet expensive activities such as sky diving, bungee jumping and white water rafting, which are some of the NZ must dos. Again, the driver will send round a clipboard and you simply pop down your name, and pay the money and that is it, you are officially booked to do it.

As we said earlier, the kiwi experience passes always have at least one on sale so snap it up fast if your thinking of doing this exciting trip. It's such an easy way to travel, book activities as well as meet fellow travellers. The general age range of our bus was 18 years old gap year students to about our age (25) however this could change from bus to bus. Unlike some other bus tours such a contiki, which is known as more of a party bus, the kiwi experience aim is to make sure you see the best New Zealand has to offer.

Auckland

Day 1

We woke up in Nadi, Fiji so so so excited because today we would fly to Auckland and meet our friend Mark. We woke up, and got a short journey to the airport, passing a man who was directing traffic, and doing so with so much happiness and rhythm, we were sad to be leaving the happy Fijan spirit . Everything was really smooth, and the short 3 hour flight was filled with Fijan attentiveness that we had had since we landed in Fiji.

We landed in Auckland pretty much unable to contain our excitement. As we left the arrivals lounge, there we spotted our buddy Mark, and we were so excited to give him a big hug!

From here, we got a beer in a bar and caught up for an hour or so. After a quick Mc Donalds and a nod to Gimley from Lord of the Rings, we flagged down a taxi, and got him to take us Auckland's CBD.

 There were two mistakes we made with our arrival to New Zealand, and the first one we were informed by the taxi driver. There was a huge Rugby game in Auckland that evening, so all of the hostels were booked up for the evening, meaning cheap places to stay were going to be impossible to find. When we got to the main city, we found the nearest I centre, something Lauren and Steve had told us were really helpful (these things are all over New Zealand and SO helpful). Through them we booked the only room we could find, which was in quite a posh hotel, so we spent more than we would have wanted, however Mark was incredibly jet lagged so he needed a bit of a pamper.

We checked into the Park Regis hotel, right on the main high street of Auckland, and Mark fell asleep almost instantly. Tom and steph stayed up and tried to phone the Kiwi Experience to book ourselves onto the bus the next day. This was when we found out the second mistake we had made. Ideally, we would have booked onto the bus the next day, however due to lack of spaces, we would have to spend the next 4 days in Auckland, where it was expensive to live, before 3 spaces were available. That said, we didn't want to waste our time in Auckland, so we decided to book up some day trips the following day.

That night our posh hotel suddenly turned into hell, when the club literally next door to our room started music at 10pm, and did so until about 3am. The music was so loud, it was like we were in there! We knew in the morning it would be our mission to move to somewhere cheaper and less noisy!

Day 2

The next morning we did just that, and with poor Mark still feeling very jet lagged, we had to lug our bags uphill to a cheaper hotel. It still wasn't as cheap as we had wanted, but it had to be quieter than the one we had stayed in the night before. Thankfully on the way up the hill, we got a good view of the famous sky tower, and there was also a Starbucks so we stopped in for a drink and to use the free WiFi (you have to pay for your Wifi everywhere in New Zealand!)

That afternoon, the hugely anticipated Flloyd Mayweather VS Manny Pacquiou boxing match was on, and we decided we would find a nice pub to sit in and watch the match. Down at the bottom of Auckland highstreet was the harbour, and here was home to plenty of pubs and restauraunt, all playing the match. We found a nice one and had some drinks, and watched the match

After the match, we headed back to our hotel and had a bit of a pamper session, face masks included. Who would have thought the day spent watching boxing would end that way!?

Day 3

The next day we moved accomodation AGAIN! This time we went to a much more back packer friendly place called Base, which we would become very familiar with over our month trip of New Zealand. At the reception, Base had a wheel of fortune style game that cost $2 to play. You could win drink deals or discounts on day trips , and there was one skinny segment that gave you a weeks free accomoadtion. We all had a go, Mark and Steph winning free drinks, but Tom the jammy bugger managed to land on the weeks free accomodaton, which would prove to be handy for our time away, as you could use them in any Base hostels in New Zealand or Australia.

After checking in to our room, we went to STA travel to enquire about day trips. The nice lady advised us that wine tasting on Waheke Island was an Auckland must do, so we decided to do that that afternoon, and we also booked up the Rangitoto volcanic island tour the following day.

We walked down to the harbour and got onto the frequent boat that took you to the islands. Waheke was a winery island, and was very pictureesque and pretty. We were advised to buy the bus ticket that would take us to the wineries which we did, but as it was a nice day, we decided to walk to the winieries rather than catch a bus, so we started our walk around the hilly island to find some vineyards, with Auckland city a distant memory behind us.



We walked up the hills passing lots of grape vines and vineyards.








The first winery we went to was called 'Cable Bay' and had been recommended to us by a few people. We walked up and went inside for a wine tasting. The tasting was $10.00 each, and we all felt very sophisticated swigging on the posh wine. We were shown the machines where the wine was made, as well as being given a brief history.





We chose our favourite wines and went outside to have a glass on the bean bags and look over the stunning view. The boys went for a nice red, and Steph a crisp Sauvignon blanc.

Whilst admiring the view we were bothered by a small duck who seemed to take a liking to mark!









After this winery, we decided to move on to the next place called 'Mud Brick', so we walked another half and hour or so to get there. We arrived at a pretty garden and walked up to the deck. The boys indulged in some more red and Steph a rose this time.







The sun started to set over Auckland, and it looked really pretty. We went to go to another winery but realised the distance wouldn't be worth going as the last boat back was in an hour. We decided to go back to cable bay, and have some more glasses of wine there which we did until dark. If you want to do a day trip to Waheke,  we would recommend going early in the morning, as we didn't get to visit half the amount of wineries we wanted to.

 Suddenly realising the time, we ran back down to the port and got back on the boat. Now feeling quite drunk, we decided to head out for a few drinks in the bar underneath our hostel 'Habana Joes', where they did free small meals for backpackers.

We ended up using our free drink vouchers we had won, and partied with the staff until the early hours of the morning, dancing and singing badly to the music they had going.

We headed back up to our rooms, making a bit of noise on the way and annoying a few neighbours. One guy came out of his room and told us to shut up so we swiftly went to bed. Steph needed the loo at some point in the night leaving her key in the room, and managed to get locked out of the room causing a huge drama as the boys were dead to the world in their drunken States.

Day 4

The next day we felt pretty rough, and we slightly regretted pre paying to do our rangitoto volcano trip as all we wanted to do was stay in bed and eat McDonalds. We begrudgingly got out of bed, and walked back over to the same port we left from to get to Waheke island. From here we went on the journey to Rangitoto Island. On the other side, we were greeted by a man on a tractor and a cart attached. We all jumped into the cart whilst he drove around the island and gave us a tour. At one point we stopped so we could climb to the highest point of the island, and take in the views. It wasn't a very nice day so there wasn't much to see, but we could look over the whole of Auckland like we had done the day before.

#douchesoutdoors 

We got back into the tractor whilst the man told us more about the island. There were traps everywhere to catch things like possums because they once riddled the island and were eating all the rare native birds. He also told us about the Tui bird, and how it would get high on the tout plant, flying in somersaults and in circles. We passed some old abandoned bachs which are what the kiwis call holiday homes. We then stopped at the volcanic rock bit, where he said we could get out and play with the rocks.

Steph overwhelmed about playing with rocks

We also went to a black sand beach which was probably the prettiest part of the trip.

To be honest when we booked the trip, we were expecting to be jumping over lava and running for our lives, but the volcano hasn't erupted in thousands of years so it is literally just a giant rock. We were slightly underwhelmed by the trip, and think if you have time to spend in Auckland, then maybe look at some of the other attractions to do before rangitoto.

That evening we met rebecca, a childhood friend of Toms who has emigrated to Auckland with her boyfriend Brad. We met her for some dinner and she said on our way back through we could spend a night at hers. We talked about the exciting trip around New Zealand we had ahead of us and she told us her favourite spots. The following day we were finally getting onto the kiwi bus to embark on our journey to Paihia and the bay of islands.