New Zealand New Zealand Blog

The worldwide premiere for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is just minutes away and New Zealand's capital city Wellington has been rushing to complete it's transformation to make it feel homely for folk with hairy feet and pointy ears. Yesterday stars jetted in for the long-awaited first movie of the Hobbit trilogy. Wellington, where much of the post production has been done, has renamed itself "the Middle of Middle Earth". Fans have had costume parties and Wellington city workers have laid a 500 m (550 yards) red carpet.

In a previous post we discussed the reasons behind the extreme measures New Zealand Customs and Biosecurity New Zealand take to stop you Bringing Food into New Zealand and the possible consequences for both you and the country. Today we are looking at your personal medication and how to bring it through New Zealand Customs with the least amount of hassle.

Named one of the "hippest" cities in the world by the New York Times, rated the third-best place in the world to live in the Mercer's survey and continuously outranking every major Australian city for quality of life - Auckland is not only a great place to live, but also a great place to visit. Describing the City of Sails as being 'geographically blessed' and with a 'vibrant Polynesian culture' the Travellers bible the Lonely Planet recently ranked Auckland, as the top 1 and 2 ‘must do’ experiences when traveling to New Zealand. Lets find out why…………

A group of intrepid New Zealanders are undertaking an amazing and some say perilous journey across the Pacific Ocean to Easter Island. They are sailing in a traditional waka hourua (double-hulled sailing canoes) without GPS or modern navigational tools, in a bid to retrace and revitalise the steps of their ancestors in Maori history; the crew are using only the stars and moon with ocean currents to guide them. Traditional methods of navigation waned soon after European settlement in the Pacific.