New Zealand Adventures Your Mom Wouldn’t Do
Black Sand Beaches, Natural Hot Water Beach Pools & The Best Hike We’ve Ever Done!
#1 Black Sand Beaches
Piha Beach (Lions Rock) / Bethells Beach
Piha and Bethells Beach are both isolated beaches and if you want to explore everything, plan on a full day to visit both beaches.
The Roam Down
- Duration: 6-7 Hours (45 min drive between beaches)
- Difficulty: Easy
- Wow Factor: Very High
- Essentials to Bring: Bug repellant (sand flies suck)
- Highlights: Lions Rock, Tide Pools Piha, Walking Both Piha & Bethells, O’neill Bay at Sunset on North end of Bethells.
Our first stop was Piha Beach. As soon as got there we crossed river on the beach and went straight for Lion’s Rock. Its not a long hike but it’s super steep, it reminded me a little of hiking Huayna Picchu in Peru. About halfway up there were a few people sitting and we noticed a fence that ran across the trail and a sign that said not to go any further. They had shut the trail down because of loose rocks on the trail. We talked to some of the people and a group of them had finished the hike anyway, so we climbed over the little fence and kept going and it was so worth it.
The trail only had about a 5 foot area that was falling apart but the rest was a cake walk. We were the only ones at the top and had long black beaches on both sides of this massive sea , it was an awesome view.
After hiking back down we grabbed our beach stuff and walked the beaches. There were a ton of surfers out and huge waves so we talked to the guys at the little food stop near the beach and they called their friend that rented out boards. After playing phone tag a bit, we were finally able to talk to the guy and arrange to meet him in an hour. The whole time James was on the phone there were these little flies that kept landing on my feet and biting me! I didn’t read up on what Sand Flies were before our trip and I’m pretty sure I was in a storm of them without realizing. There are only two species of sand flies and one of these species lives in New Zealand. They are like mosquitos but they’ll actually make you love mosquitos, no joke. Instead of being nice like a mosquito and just poking you real quick, sand flies actually bite a chunk of your flesh off and can make you bleed. The bites don’t start itching until after a day or two so most of the bites aren’t noticeable right away. But once they start itching, they don’t stop for like 2-3 weeks! I came home with over 50 bites 🙁 I did find out that vinegar helps take away the itching though, I wish I would’ve known that in NZ.
So while we were waiting for the surfboard we went on a walk on the left end of the beach. It looked like there was a cove area and a lot of people were coming from there. Once we got closer it turned out to be this beautiful enclosed cove that you could get to when the tide was down, with a little cave, and big waves hitting the enclosing rocks. It was one of of the prettier parts of Piha Beach, a little hidden gem.
So while we were waiting for the surfboard we went on a walk on the left end of the beach. It looked like there was a cove area and a lot of people were coming from there. Once we got closer it turned out to be this beautiful enclosed cove that you could get to when the tide was down, with a little cave, and big waves hitting the enclosing rocks. It was one of of the prettier parts of Piha Beach, a little hidden gem.
After Piha Beach, we headed to Te Henga, Bethells Beach. It rained on us almost the whole way there but by the time we got there the storm had passed and we had the entire beach to ourselves. Taylor Swift used this beach in her ‘Out of the Woods’ music video and calls it the most beautiful beach she’s been to. This was another black sand beach. We had to walk a little bit to get to it. It was sooo long and super wide and probably the biggest beach I’ve been to. It was just us and another couple way out in the distance on the beach. We eventually were in the same area and they were nice and asked us if we needed someone to take our picture. When we started getting closer to the cave we crossed paths again and they said they would show us where the best pictures are taken so we walked with them to the cave and they took our pictures. We ended up walking the rest of the beach back with them. They were from NZ and lived near the beach, they talked a lot about politics in NZ and how they are worried about the NZ culture being lost because a ton of people from Asia are moving to their country and not integrating into the NZ culture, and they are already seeing certain cultural changes in their communities. The couple also told us, we came on the best day because usually the beach is covered with hundreds of people and for some reason today literally no one else was there. They said there was a storm warning and that was probably why.
After we got to the end of the beach, the sun was about to set, so the couple told us to run over to the other beach on the right side for the best views. We made it to the beach just in time to walk the sunset over the rocky beach and some surfers. On our way back we ran and jumped down a huge sand dune and walked the rest of the beach in the night.
#2 The Hot Water Beach
There’s no other experience like this!
Words cannot describe how amazing it was to watch the sunrise on this beach while sitting in a one of a kind natural hot spring on the beach.
The Roam Down
- Duration: 2-3 Hours (ONLY ACCESSIBLE at low tide – check tides)
- Difficulty: Easy
- Wow Factor: Very High
- Essentials to Bring: Shovel (Rent one at the Hot Water Beach TOP 10 Holiday Park)
- Highlights: Watching Sunrise, Hot Tub on the Beach on a Cool Morning.
This is one of our absolute favorite experiences in New Zealand! One of those experiences that you won’t find anywhere else!
#3 Cathedral Cove
The best beach tunnels you’ll ever visit.
Beautiful hike with a steep down climb at the end to the cove. Worth every step!
The Roam Down
- Duration: 2-3 Hours
- Difficulty: Moderate
- Wow Factor: High
- Essentials to Bring: Camera
- Highlights: the COVE (as seen in Chronicles of Narnia movie)
Today we flew from Queenstown back to Auckland, picked up our rental car from Scotties, and headed to Hahei, NZ! One of our main tools for finding awesome places to visit, is to pull up google maps and look for images right on the map. It’s a strange way to plan a trip but almost all of our NZ trip was sporadically planned this way.
It took about 2.5 hours to get to the Te Whanganui-A-Hei Marine Reserve at the Coromandel Peninsula. There are a lot of expensive tours ($300+) of Cathedral Cove, but the best way to see it (just like the rest of NZ) is to just rent your own car and drive there yourself. Parking is easy and the walk is only maybe a 30 minute walk from the parking lot down to the cove. Its a windy little paved path thats downhill pretty much the whole way.
When we reached the beach, to the right there was a small sprinkling waterfall falling right onto the sand. To the left was the beautiful arched cave that you can walk through to get to the rest of the beach. Its a beautiful sight. Cathedral Cove is a must see of NZ. It’s also another place famous for being in a movie- The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, the cave was a portal to Narnia, and its also in the ‘Can’t Hold Us’ music video by Macklemore and Ryan Lewis, which also features multiple other NZ locations. Still today Cathedral Cove is a spiritual location guarded by the ancestors of its founders back in the 1400’s.
#4 Queenstown Hill
This view you won’t want to miss.
Words cannot describe how amazing it was to watch the sunrise on this beach while sitting in a one of a kind natural hot spring on the beach.
THE ROAM DOWN
- Duration: 3-4 Hours
- Difficulty: Moderate
- Wow Factor: High
- Essentials to Bring: Jacket (it gets cold on the top and you never know when it’ll rain)
- Highlights: The View
Today we are flying from the North Island to the South Island and landing in Queenstown! We didn’t know we were about to fall in love with a new place. Queenstown is like Park City but so. much. better. Its a small city, not as spread out, but with beautiful tall peaked mountains surrounding it and a huge lake on one side. The city overall has lots of charm and character. As our flight was landing, we could look out both windows of the plane and see snowy mountains on both sides as we were flying right between them. It was an incredible sight. The airport is also super small and the place really just had a small town feel. Queenstown is also the adventure capitol of the world so a lot of people travel here just to skydive, bungie jump (this is where it was invented), jet boat, canyon swing, mountain bike, etc.
Our first stop in Queenstown was…. wait for it… McDonalds! haha we’ve learned that McDonalds is the best place in NZ to get free internet. Especially since good internet is incredibly hard to come by in NZ. We also grabbed some cheap food since food here is very expensive. Usually the cheapest item on any menu in NZ was between $25-$30 American dollars per person. The lady at McDonalds made sure to tell me that their country doesn’t supersize like in America, when she gave us our ‘large’ drink that looked like a child’s size small.
We decided we had to hike Queenstown Hill. We typed it into our gps, which took us to some guys ranch out on some farmland in Queenstown. We realized someone must’ve mistakenly marked their house as Queenstown Hill but it was worth it because James got to chase the guys sheep around the property and there were some really cute baby sheep. We turned around and tried again and found the real trailhead which was across town, in the middle of a neighborhood. The hiked started off with Pine Trees all around, and soon led us to an immaculate garden of cairns (so we made our own awesome one), and eventually as we hiked further and got closer to the top the trees thinned out and we were hiking on dirt and gravel.
There’s a marker before reaching the saddle so we checked out the look-out spot before continuing onto the steep park of the hike. From the top we could see all of Queenstown city below, the lake, mountains, it was an awesome view. We spent a little time on top enjoying the view and then we heard some weird sirens start going off down below so once it started raining we headed back down the hill.
We were pretty close to Queenstown Garden so we headed over there and walked all around it. Its a huge garden that runs along the side of Queenstown Lake. They have an outdoor bowling alley, but apparently bowling there is more like shuffleboard but on grass. The garden also had a frisbee golf course and a mountain biking path. It was a really nice garden with lots of pretty trees and flowers and a rope swing over the lake.
We booked a tour for the next day in Fiordland National Park so we decided to drive to Te Anau instead of staying the night in Queenstown. The drive to Te Anau took us 3 hours because we stopped like every 5 mins to take in the gorgeous scenery, its normally about a 2 hour drive. The entire drive there was all rolling farmlands, with sheep, cattle, or deer farms all along the way, with the sun setting in the background. Basically every area in New Zealand that’s not a bustling city is beautiful, green, and unrealistic perfectly sheep-groomed farmland! It’s just picture perfect from all angles.
#5 Keys Summit
The best hike in all New Zealand.
Beautiful hike with a steep down climb at the end to the cove. Worth every step!
THE ROAM DOWN
- Duration: 3-4 Hours
- Difficulty: Hard
- Wow Factor: Extreme
- Essentials to Bring: Jacket, Water, Camera
- Highlights: The Glorious View at Keys Summit
Today we are flying from the North Island to the South Island and landing in Queenstown! We didn’t know we were about to fall in love with a new place. Queenstown is like Park City but so. much. better. Its a small city, not as spread out, but with beautiful tall peaked mountains surrounding it and a huge lake on one side. The city overall has lots of charm and character. As our flight was landing, we could look out both windows of the plane and see snowy mountains on both sides as we were flying right between them. It was an incredible sight. The airport is also super small and the place really just had a small town feel. Queenstown is also the adventure capitol of the world so a lot of people travel here just to skydive, bungie jump (this is where it was invented), jet boat, canyon swing, mountain bike, etc.
Our first stop in Queenstown was…. wait for it… McDonalds! haha we’ve learned that McDonalds is the best place in NZ to get free internet. Especially since good internet is incredibly hard to come by in NZ. We also grabbed some cheap food since food here is very expensive. Usually the cheapest item on any menu in NZ was between $25-$30 American dollars per person. The lady at McDonalds made sure to tell me that their country doesn’t supersize like in America, when she gave us our ‘large’ drink that looked like a child’s size small.
We decided we had to hike Queenstown Hill. We typed it into our gps, which took us to some guys ranch out on some farmland in Queenstown. We realized someone must’ve mistakenly marked their house as Queenstown Hill but it was worth it because James got to chase the guys sheep around the property and there were some really cute baby sheep. We turned around and tried again and found the real trailhead which was across town, in the middle of a neighborhood. The hiked started off with Pine Trees all around, and soon led us to an immaculate garden of cairns (so we made our own awesome one), and eventually as we hiked further and got closer to the top the trees thinned out and we were hiking on dirt and gravel.
There’s a marker before reaching the saddle so we checked out the look-out spot before continuing onto the steep park of the hike. From the top we could see all of Queenstown city below, the lake, mountains, it was an awesome view. We spent a little time on top enjoying the view and then we heard some weird sirens start going off down below so once it started raining we headed back down the hill.
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