If you’re ready for an invigorating holiday that gives your lungs and legs a good workout amidst jaw-dropping landscapes, the South Island of New Zealand or Te Waipounamu could be just the ticket.

Think long scenic drives with the road stretching out endlessly into the horizon, with the occasional twisting and turning along sheer cliff faces, and hugging the pebbled shorelines of shimmering azure lakes. Think a LOT of uphill hiking and filling your lungs with big gulping breaths of crisp mountain air to finally reach panoramic views that just might be the balm to soothe your tired doomscrolling eyes.

I spent 10 days in South Island, flying into Queenstown and out of Christchurch to avoid having to drive all the way back and save time. I managed to cover 3 national parks (out of 10!) on the island – Fiordland, Mt. Aspiring and Mt. Cook – driving around 1400 km as per the map below.

New Zealand South Island Travel Diary Part 1: Te Anau

Upon landing in Queenstown I picked up my rental car at the airport and drove to Te Anau. Spending 30 hours in aeroplanes and airports and emerging jet lagged and bleary eyed, to get into a car and drive down a coastal road with more than a few twists and turns, and scenery that is more than a little distracting, was not the smartest idea in hindsight. If I were to do it again I would have spent that first night in Queenstown and driven the next day.

Anyway, I made it in one piece. The four towns I stayed in during this trip – Te Anau, Queenstown, Wanaka and Lake Tekapo – are similar in that they are all small lakeside towns with relatively compact “high street” areas where all the eating joints and supermarkets are clustered together. Te Anau is a good base to explore Fiordland National Park. One of the most popular things to do in this Park is take a cruise on Milford Sound. Unfortunately although I had booked one, a 24 hour delay in my flight out of London scuppered that plan. Instead I headed straight for my first hike – the Lake Marian Track. The car park at the trailhead is about 1.5 hours away from Te Anau – a fairly straight drive up state highway 94. The Sandfly Cafe in Te Anau is a good bet to pack a sandwich for the hike. The hike starts off as relatively easy with a wooden walkway overlooking a series of rushing waterfalls. But the going gets more difficult with a lot of fairly steep scrambling over tree roots and rocks through a dense moss-laden forest that looks straight out of a Brothers Grimm fairytale. The spectacularly scenic and serene Lake Marian at the end makes it all worthwhile.

The whole hike took me about 5-6 hours. That evening I took a tour to the Te Anau Glowworm caves. I couldn’t take any photos but would highly recommend the tour which includes navigating a stream rushing through 12,000 year old limestone caves in a little boat in pitch black darkness with the roof of the caves speckled with blue pinpricks of light, which are literally shining out of the butts of glowworms!

New Zealand South Island Travel Diary Part 2: Queenstown

The next day I drove to Queenstown – the liveliest and busiest of the four towns I stayed in. The lakeshore in Queenstown has a nice promenade and I highly recommend Yonder as a cafe for delicious (and vegan friendly) brunches.

A popular day trip from Queenstown is to Glenorchy – which is just under an hour away. The Queenstown-Glenorchy drive itself is very scenic, a coastal road hugging the shores of Lake Wakatipu (probably the cutest name for a lake ever, go on, say it three times and I guarantee it will make you smile). Glenorchy is a small rustic township with a short, easy boardwalk track crossing through wetlands which makes for a pleasant afternoon walk. A quick 10-15 minute drive from Glenorchy is the Isengard Lookout – apparently made famous as a shooting location in the Lord of the Rings movies. There is no signage near the lookout but if you park near the start of the bridge over Dart River, you can walk under the bridge and out onto the river bed to get some nice shots.


The next day I did the Ben Lomond hike but I will admit I cheated and did a much shorter version of the full hike by taking the Skyline Gondola from the town centre to the trailhead and ending my hike at the “Saddle” which is a viewpoint about 2 hours from the trailhead via a well maintained track. The Ben Lomond Summit is another hour up from the Saddle but it was a rainy cloudy day and the summit was shrouded in heavy mist, making it singularly unappealing especially as that last leg is supposed to be very challenging and very steep. Why risk life and limb when there is little chance of a clear view from the top?

Speaking of views, there is a viewing platform at the Gondola station where you can get a great aerial shot of the Queenstown cove.

The next morning before driving to my next stop, I went for a walk through the picturesque Queenstown Garden with its giant gnarly trees, pretty pink blooms and a lakeside path leading back to the town centre.

New Zealand South Island Travel Diary Part 3: Wanaka

On the drive from Queenstown to Wanaka, the “frontier chic” township of Arrowtown is a nice spot for brunch. Once a rough-and-tumble mining settlement, the former miners’ cottages are now hipster cafes and there are knots of tourists milling around taking pictures of the old-timey pharmacy and post office.

The Crown Range drive to Wanaka, while short (1 hour), has some seriously hairy hairpin turns. Apparently there is an easier way to Wanaka via the Cromwell Road but my car satnav system wouldn’t pick it up so twistin’ and turnin’ I went. My hotel in Wanaka was a 10 minute walk from “That Wanaka Tree” one of the most photographed spots in New Zealand so that was my first stop.

I did two hikes over the next 2 days – Roy’s Peak and the Rob Roy Glacier Track. Roy’s Peak was the toughest of all the hikes I did on this trip. It is a relentlessly steep uphill slog and there are no trees or shade along the track so the sun beating down on a clear cloudless day makes it considerably harder. I would highly recommend carrying at least 2 bottles of water. There is a spectacular viewpoint where you can expect a short queue to walk out on a narrow track to get your “money shot” – a panoramic view of Lake Wanaka and the Mount Aspiring/Tititea range. The Roy’s Peak track is broad and well maintained and the hike took me about 5-6 hours (I skipped the summit here too and turned back after the viewpoint). The trailhead is only a 5 minute drive from the town which means you can get back to your hotel quickly and collapse into an aching heap.

The parking lot at the Roy’s Peak trailhead fills up pretty quickly so I would recommend starting the hike early – I got there just before 8am and barely found a spot. I didn’t find the track too crowded – I was there in early autumn / end of March. There were just enough people so on the way up there was always someone I could plaintively ask how much further it is to the top, and on the way down there was always someone I could smile sympathetically and encouragingly at (while secretly feeling REALLY smug that I had survived the worst of it!).

The next day I headed for the Rob Roy Glacier Track. Although it is not far (about 1.5 hours away) from Wanaka, over half the drive is on a very rough gravel track through private farmland. What makes it even slower going is frequently running into cattle traffic jams and having to honk and manoeuvre carefully through throngs of cows who are mooing and glaring at you indignantly in return. With considerable relief I reached the Raspberry Flat carpark and set off across open grasslands speckled with tiny yellow wildflowers to a swing bridge across the West Matukituki river which marks the beginning of the track. Thereafter, most of the track is through alpine forests with some steep scrambles up tree roots and piles of rocks and scree (though not as difficult as Lake Marian) and then through a narrow gorge alongside the Rob Roy stream tumbling rapidly over its rocky bed. Sometimes the path is difficult to make out, but luckily there are a little orange triangles nailed to the trees at regular intervals so it is difficult to get lost.

There is a lower lookout (which isn’t really much of a lookout) and then an upper lookout which faces a sheer rock cliff crowned with glaciers and threaded with delicate waterfalls. A nice spot to munch on your packed sandwich or protein bar. The part of the track between the lower and upper lookout is apparently prone to avalanche risk between May-November during and after heavy rain or snowfall – if that’s the case I would skip this hike entirely.

New Zealand South Island Travel Diary Part 4: Lake Tekapo

From Wanaka I drove to my final stop – Lake Tekapo. The smallest and prettiest of the towns I stayed in. The waters of the lake are the clearest and most brilliant teal colour I’ve seen. Visitors over the years have painstakingly created dozens of rock stacks on the pebbled lake shore near the Church of the Good Shepherd.

My last hike on this trip was the Hooker Valley Track. The drive to the trailhead includes a winding stretch hugging the shoreline of Lake Pukaki. At one point on the drive you turn a corner to see THAT jaw-dropping view of the snowy Aoraki/Mt Cook range on the horizon. The drive which was meant to take an hour took two-and-a-half hours because I couldn’t resist the urge to pull over every 5-10 minutes to photograph that view. Fortunately the folks who designed the road system in this part of New Zealand helpfully included spaces to pull over by the side every few kilometres.

The Hooker Valley Track was the most scenic and the easiest of all the hikes I did – for the most part its a flat boardwalk crisscrossing a tranquil green valley, with a minty pistachio green river running alongside linking two glacier-fed lakes which bookend the track – Mueller Lake and Hooker Lake. Perhaps because the track is so easy, it is VERY popular and you are often jostling your way through large (mostly Chinese) guided tour groups. There are three suspension bridges across the river on the track and you sometimes have to wait in a short queue to get across. But the stunning scenery is well worth such minor inconveniences as all through the hike you are surrounded on all sides by mountains adorned with glittering glaciers, gossamer waterfalls and rolling cloud banks.

Lake Tekapo is also known for its dark skies which are ideal for stargazing but unfortunately it was too cloudy both nights I was there – I figure that’s just another reason to try and revisit these isles one day…