Reuthers
Highlights / New Zealand
Self Drive Motorcycle Tour

Kia Ora to Auckland, the City of Sails.

After breakfast you will pick up your Harley-Davidson motorcycle at the rental station. On the Pacific Coast Highway you will cruise today through the beautiful Coromandel area to Whitianga. You will spend the night right near the beach, where once Captain Cook raised the British flag.

After breakfast and a wonderful stroll you will reach Hot Water Beach, an Aotearoa New Zeland Must Do and one of its most intriguing places. From the sound of surging waves to the surprising warmth of hot sand underneath your bare feet at low Tide, Hot Water Beach has achieved cult-like status as a worldwide wonder right here on the Coromandel. Right before Rotorua the smell of sulfur and blubbering and roaring geysers awaits you. Pure New Zealand culture is what you have in the evening at Te Puia in the form of an Original Hangi Dinner, Maori dances and songs as well as the traditional Haka. You then enjoy a hot chocolate upon a naturally heated rock-seating overlooking the dramatically lit Pohutu Geyser.

Overwhelmed by the nature events you experienced in Rotorua, you continue your trip to Taupo where you will stop at the Lake Taupo, the largest inland water of New Zealand and enjoy the lovely view of Mount Ruapehu and its height of 2797m. Your destination today is Napier, after the great earthquake in 1931, it is a newly built city in the Art-Deco style. You will spend the night near the beach promenade, the Marine Parade.

With all the time in the world you will travel today to Wellington, the capital of New Zealand.

Before you leave the northern island to head south, you will visit New Zealands National Museum Te Papa. In the early afternoon you will then take the Interislander for the short transfer to Picton. From Picton you will travel along Tasman Bay directly to Nelson, New Zealands first city ever. By the way the area around Nelson has the highest amount of sunshine hours in New Zealand - ideal for motorcyclists, of whom around Nelson there should be way over 400 (!)...

As a day tour, you will today undertake an excursion into the Abel Tasman National Park where you will be dropped off per water taxi at the beach and after a walk in the free wilderness simply be picked up again.

Your motorcycle tour leads you southwest along the famous Buller Gorge Road to Cape Foulwind and south to the Pancake Rocks. Here you will get a close up view of the blowholes with the spraying seawater. You will spend the night in the coastal city Greymouth.

You will pass Hokitika, the old gold mining town Ross and enjoy the all uniting landscape with imposing mountains, green rain forest and the Tasman Sea to the right. In Franz Josef you will set up our sleeping quarters below the Franz Josef Glacier. Depending on the weather, there is the possibility for a helicopter flight with a landing on the famous glacier or to take a breathtaking quad tour in the rain forest.

Passing the Fox Glacier you will leave the Tasman Sea, cross the Haast Pass and reach Wanaka. A lonely mountain road leads you to the most exciting city of New Zealand, the adventure capital Queenstown. In the early evening you are taking a spectacular cruise on Lake Wakatipu for dinner in the Colonel's Homestead restaurant of the Walter Peak High Country Sheep Farm and to get an insight into the work on a New Zealand farm on a farm tour. The TSS Earnslaw, the oldest coal fueled steam ship of New Zealand and one of the last in the world, brings you to this wonderful place and afterwards back again to Queenstown.

In the morning you are welcome for action and sights to see: Start your day with a gondola ride, taking you 480m up over Lake Wakatipu to the top of Bob's Peak. You can also jump off the historic Kawarau Bridge (Bungee Jumping), enjoy para sailing or riding with a jet boat on the Kawarau River. Or you spend your time with an abundant shopping tour in Queenstown, as our trip to Te Anau continues on in the early afternoon.

Today a world wonder is on the program, one of the most famous symbols of New Zealand: the Milford Sound in the rain-laden zone of New Zealand. Here you will take a cruise on the 16 kilometer long fjord to the Tasmanian Sea and at the same time observe penguins, sea lions, dolphins, sometimes even whales, as well as the most spectacular waterfalls in New Zealand.

Today's highlight on your way to Dunedin is the famous Nugget Point with its lighthouse.

On Day 14 you travel to the foothills of Mount Cook, New Zealand’s highest mountain at a height of 3753m (13,316 feet). You stop for coffee and a spectacular view of the snow-covered mountain at the famous Hermitage Hotel, a truly special place with unmistakeable charm. You end the day riding along back Lake Pukaki before spending the night at your Lake Tekapo hotel.

On your last day you visit the Church of the Good Shepherd at Lake Takapo before travelling across the South Island on the Inland Scenic Route to Christchurch, the largest city in the South Island of New Zealand, where you return your Harley-Davidson motorcycle to the rental station.
Here are a few tips for anyone who would like to get to know Christchurch better: Visit Cathedral Square, the Canterbury National Museum or go gift shopping in the city center. For romantics, we recommend the River Avon, where you can be pushed along by straw-hatted young men in wooden boats - comparisons with Venice come to mind. Directly at the airport, a detour to the Antarctic Center with a tour in the original Häglund is worthwhile.