stevieb1007

Hi ,, myself , my wife and our 2 small kids are coming out to NZ the begining of sept for a final job interview etc in Auckland.
We have booked a beach villa for one week in the area then are going to travel around as much of the North Island as we can.

We are wondering wether to use Homestays,Motels or whatever on our travels ??.

Any advice or help on this would be great.

many thanks

steve

howden40

Used a camper van when traveling in France once but I wasn't happy with the lack of proper seat belts. Also traveled in car with camping gear, I felt much safer with the seat belts.

When we traveled around NZ for a month with youngsters we hired a car. purchased camping gear and did a mix of camping and chalets depending on the weather (took the gear back to UK). The kids loved the variety as they enjoy camping. Campsites have showers etc so not a problem. Easy to cook on 2 ring burners.

Because we had no TV I feel we saw more as no distractions.

Played Rhoal Dahl CD's when travelling - James and the Giant Peach was the boys favourite.


It worked for us.
Pauline

pixi-dust

we're just back from a huge south island trip. We took the car and didn't book anywhere ( except our first night) it meant we had total freedom, if we were tired we stopped earlier, if we weren't we drove more. We never had a problem finding anywhere to stay. My brother did a similar trip to us in a campervan. He said on some on the smaller roads it was a bit cumbersome, and sometimes they felt a bit conspicuous - all their belongings were in it etc..but that's just his feelings.

NakiMan

Personally, I'd hire a car and stay in motels

As someone else said, campers can be cumbersome to get down smaller roads, and it can be a problem to find somewhere to park them in towns. Plus, of course, they use more fuel

Petrol costs $2.10 (85p) a litre and a Corolla should do about 11k or 12k/litre

Outside the main cities, a motel should cost you $120 or so, and motels in NZ come fully equiped with kitchens, fridges, microwaves, china, cutlery etc

teebrown

We went around in a 6 berth campervan, and loved it, my parents who follwed were in a car, we all stayed at the www.top10.co.nz campsites, we never had to book any and they all had playparks and swimming pools etc for the kids, very cheap but very clean and tidy and welcoming.

teebrown

Oh I forgot, if you order the Top10 discount card before you go, you get 20% of every stay and tons of resturants and attractions.

luvwelly

I agree with this...hire a car and do motels and hotels...the rates for families are much lower here than in the UK and family rooms/apartment arrangements are much more common. If you prefer to chart out a route and pre-book accommodation you can probably book most of it over the net....that's what I did for our grand tour of North Island and I will do the same for South Island this summer.

stevieb1007

many many thanks for all of your advice , it has been of great help.!!
Cant wait to get there and to start exploring...hope we all fall in love with the place and that it persuades my wife to leave the in-laws behind....thanks again...steve

luvwelly

She'll be happy to leave her in-laws behind I'm sure....you mean her parents I expect!

stevieb1007

Yeah , she is really really close to her parents and they are being a little bit selfish at the minute ...pulling the emotional heart strings !!!....I thought our dream was over last week but we have chatted and agreed we have to go and at least look ..steve

Am Loolah

Hi,

We had so much fun travelling around for 3 weeks with our 4 kids in a campervan - I actually harp on now that I would sell all our material possessions and live in a bus travelling round in the blink of an eye. But my Hubby reckons with 4 kids and 2 dogs we'd get to the end of our road before I was swearing like a trooper and ordering an about turn back to the house!

We found our itinerary got cast aside within the first 4 days as we had thought we'd cover much more distance in a much shorter timespan than we did. You need to enjoy and explore the places you get to without literally bedding down and setting off the next morning for the next place on your must see list!

How long have you got and where do you really want to see? Start with that and plan around it. Oh and maybe ask on here for estimates on the driving times as I guarantee it'll be longer than you think!

luvwelly

If you do plan and book in advance - do it with minimum 2 night stays...sometimes 3, that way you get to relax and explore...covering big distances everyday by road is not fun for kids anyway. Try to avoid today is Monday it must be Auckland syndrome!

jjthefridge

Hi,

While we were in nz, we used motels everywhere most we paid was $11o per night and some are much cheaper, depends if you want kitchen and bath or shower and micro wave.

Car hire don't use avis etc, use smaller companies, cars are much cheaper, you won't have the newest thing going but it'll get you there.

You can get guides everywhere on motels etc, things like kfg cheap as chips, or buy food in supermarkets, the heat up in room, gives you good idea on cost of living, got some recomendations of places we stayed. if you'd like to know.

j.j.

Kiwiprincess

Another thing to keep an eye out for, if you are concerned about costs and staying in camp grounds are 'tourist flats' or 'tourist cabins'. In many places there are just basically just basic forms of motels. They still include kitchens, separate bedrooms etc. Just a bit more basic.