Overview

Most NZ locals won’t recommend Auckland — it’s big, it doesn’t have a lot of pretty old buildings, it sprawls a lot — it sorta had a Los Angeles vibe to me. We didn’t hate it, but 3 nights was definitely more than is required.

Hotel Britomart was far from our favorite hotel — the rooms were just tiny to the point of claustrophobia. Nice location though.

We thought Waiheke was delightful — very pretty island, even just the ferry ride is lovely, and there are quite a few excellent wineries once there (see “Wine” section above).

Wandering the harbor was fun — Auckland is where a lot of the NZ yachting community is, you see one of their America’s Cup boats (and can I think ride in one, though we didn’t do that).

What We Did

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Where We Stayed

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Food & Dining

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Practical Tips

• Getting there
• Getting around
• What to bring
• Best time to visit

Looking back towards Auckland from Waiheke Island

Lovely artwork at a Waiheke winery

Passage Rock was one of several lovely wineries on Waiheke Island.

KZ1, also known as "The Big Boat" or "New Zealand," was a 40-meter (135 ft) carbon-fibre monohull built to challenge for the 1988 America's Cup. There's a lot of lawsuits and complexities involved if you want to Google it, and this boat eventually lost, but is considered historic for its pushing the boundaries of monohull ship architecture.