The 18 Day Kahu Adventure tour shows you the highlights of New Zealand in under 18 days. Travel from Auckland through to Queenstown on our small group tour, meeting the friendly locals and ticking off those bucket list highlights as you go.
Our fully guided Adventure tours include some meals and activities but we leave plenty of room for optional extras so you can make the adventure your own!
Days
- 18 days, 17 nights
Group size
- Max 24
Start / finish
- Auckland / Queenstown
Return
- See itinerary for details
Accommodation
- 17 nights, twin share — Haka House Auckland, two at Hahei Beach Resort, Haka House Rotorua, one at Kohutapu Lodge on Lake Aniwhenua, Haka House Taupo, alpine chalets at Tongariro, two at the Cambridge Hotel in Wellington, two at The Barn in Marahau, two at Rainforest Retreat in Franz Josef, and four at Haka House Queenstown Lakefront. Rooms are dorm share.
Transport
- A private air-conditioned coach with an expert local guide, the Cook Strait ferry across to the South Island, a water taxi into Anchorage Bay in Abel Tasman, transfers to both ends of the Tongariro Alpine Crossing, and a coach and cruise boat for the Milford Sound day trip.
Meals
- 17 breakfasts and two dinners. One dinner is a full traditional hāngī buffet at Kohutapu Lodge.
Route
Included experiences
- Milford Sound — a day trip from Queenstown with a cruise on the fjord
- Tongariro Alpine Crossing — one of the world's great one-day hikes
- Abel Tasman National Park — a water taxi into Anchorage Bay, and Cleopatra's Pools
- Kohutapu Lodge — sacred rock carvings, learning the haka and flax weaving, then a hāngi buffet
- Hobbiton — the movie set on the road to Rotorua
- Cathedral Cove — a sunrise kayak, or a boat around the sea caves, on the Hahei free day
- Hot Water Beach — digging your own hot pool in the sand
- Karangahake Gorge — a scenic walk on the way south
- Kerosene Creek — a soak in a naturally hot river
- Franz Josef — the Glacier Valley hike, bush tracks and a soak in the spa
- Lake Matheson — the mirror lake on the drive inland
- Punakaiki Pancake Rocks and Buller Gorge on the wild West Coast
- Queenstown — four nights with two full free days
- Wellington — a free day for Te Papa, the cable car or Weta Workshop
- Tawhai Falls — Gollum's pool, in Tongariro National Park
- Whakarewarewa Forest — a walk among the redwoods
Pictures / Videos
Reviews
4.9
Based on 9 reviews
Verified from
Real reviews from travellers who've done this tour, gathered from around the web and paraphrased.
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Where they come from. Our reviews are gathered from independent review sites and from guests who share feedback with us directly after their trip. They come from people who have actually travelled on the tour.
Why some are edited. Many of our guests travel in their second or third language. Where a review is hard to read, we lightly edit spelling, grammar and punctuation, or paraphrase a sentence for clarity. We never change the rating, the meaning or the sentiment, and we never write a review on a guest's behalf.
Reading the originals. Reviews sourced from public review sites appear there in their original form, and can be read in full at their original source at any time.
“Amazing North to South Ruru Tour”
This was my first time on a long organised tour and am happy to say that it exceeded my expectations. The tour was extremely well organised and when the itinerary had to change due to bad weather, alternative options for activities were arranged.
My highlights in the north were The Blue Duck Station, Hobbiton and Wellington. The south island literally blew me away on a daily basis, the scenery got better and better as you travelled down the West Coast, however I particularly enjoyed Abel Tasman, Queenstown and Lake Tekapo. The accomodations on the Select Tour were all of a really good standard, however in hindsight, paying the single person supplement would have been worth it.
Our group (6 in the north, with 5 more joining in the south) all got along fantastically and this was greatly helped by our guide Leon who worked hard to encourage us to gel as a group early on and kept us entertained during long journeys . I found Leon to be very down to earth, funny and informative as we moved around the country. I didn't expect to learn so much about the country and it's history as i did. His extensive winery knowledge was an added bonus too.
All in all, I would highly recommend this tour, and while we were unlucky with rain in the north, April turned out to be the perfect month so see the South Island and the snow capped mountains
“Great time”
Leon our tour guide was very competent, he took great care of our additional booked activities, without him we could not have done some things.
It was a pity that the app often suggested activities that were not possible in time at the tour and somehow was not properly known what is now activities moderately included and what is not.
“Soxx is the best driver ever”
He's funny, participates in the group fun and often initiates it! He was an integral part of fostering a sense of community among us.
He makes us build a common playlist on the first day which helps break the ice.
I thought his jokes were terrible at first but after having other drivers I now miss them haha.
“Room for improvement but a great trip”
My girlfriend and I travelled on the Jonah pass (North Island only) between Jan and Feb. Overall we had a great time, went to cool places and met some lovely people. However, a few aspects of Stray were pretty poor and could definitely be improved.
There is no real flexibility in the Stray buses. In summer they're so busy that if you've not booked your buses at least two weeks in advance, you're most likely not going to get on the buses you want. You cannot just arrive somewhere and if you like it, decide to stay a few extra days. This was a big selling point for us, so I think the website should make this clearer - currently it suggests booking five days in advance in busy periods, but there's no way this is enough. Luckily we managed to get dates near enough the ones originally planned without it being too disruptive, but plenty of people we met had stories of being trapped somewhere they didn't want to be because they couldn't get a bus. I think the best was a guy who arrived in Paihia on the first day, went to book his bus out and the next available one was in three weeks. He ended up paying for an Intercity bus to rejoin a different Stray bus elsewhere. Yes, it is flexible - as long as you plan in advance where you want to be and make sure all your buses are booked.
We had four drivers in total, and these varied from useless and unhelpful to fine to amazing. The gulf between the last driver we had, who was amazing, and the first drivers - who were definitely not - was incredibly wide.
We started our trip in Auckland and were picked up in a minivan for the drive up to Paihia. This driver said they work for an agency and don't really like driving for Stray. Nice start.
This driver booked us all on for the Cape Reinga day trip the following day, which was run by an external company, Fullers. We turned up for this and in our group of about 15 on that minibus, only to find that the Stray driver had failed to book about half of us on, despite saying he had. So, half got on the Fullers coach and the remainder of us were left to very quickly work out what to do. It was only because the people at Fullers were so helpful that we were able to squeeze on a few different buses. So the first full day of our Stray trip got off to a pretty stressful and unpleasant start. Could have been worse though - the following week we met a girl whose Stray driver told them the Fullers coach left at 9am, so they all turned up only to find that it had left at 0715.
Our next driver (a proper Stray driver as opposed to an agency driver) was pretty rude and unhelpful. E.g she said 'ask me anything when we're on the bus, but when I'm off the bus and have a drink in my hand I don't want to be bothered with questions'. Really helpful when it's right at the start of the trip and so many people were stressed by not understanding how it's meant to work, the app not working properly and whether they're correctly booked on to their buses.
This particular driver was also definitely not a valuable source of kiwi knowledge - some of the stuff they said was just wrong - we knew having spent the whole previous day on the Fullers tour with a professional local guide and visiting local museums - and other massive areas were glossed over with a few vague words. We would have been disappointed if the quality of drivers stayed at this level, but luckily it improved! Our next driver was a step up, but our final driver, Shorty, was amazing. She couldn't have done more for anyone on the bus and even though we were only with her for about five days out of a month it really did help make the trip. She was such a nice person, really fun, knew her stuff and you could easily tell how passionate she was about the job and about New Zealand. As I said, the difference between the drivers we had was massive, and it's a shame that something that can have such a big impact your trip is basically down to luck of the draw.
Everything's booked on the app and WiFi is either costly or crap at hostels, so I'd suggest picking up a Sim card with a data plan when you arrive. They're not expensive and it also means you can use the long bus journeys to plan what you're doing/where you're staying next etc.
On the topic of booking stuff, we looked at Booking.com or Hostelworld and often found the same hostel Stray were staying at for a cheaper price, or just a better nearby hostel for a lower price. At some stops you'll just look weird and antisocial if you do this, but definitely in the bigger towns and cities, people stayed at different places, and could also avoid the generally crappy Base hostels that are often on the Stray app.
I'm glad we chose Stray over Kiwi Experience. I'd read beforehand that Kiwi was a younger crowd with more of a focus on partying. I didn't want to generalise too much but having met loads of people off the Kiwi bus on our Stray trip, and having friends at home who did the Kiwi Experience, I could safely say that this is true.
The Kiwi bus is a younger, mostly British crowd, whereas Stray seemed ever so slightly older and the majority of people on it were probably Dutch and German, although on both buses you get people from all over the place.
Kiwi bus people we met were either partying every night or complaining that their bus was partying every night. I'm British and love drinking every night but I didn't really go to New Zealand to drink with English people every day; it's also bloody expensive to drink in NZ so glad I didn't! Of course this is a generalisation and there were older people on the Kiwi bus and people who liked partying on the Stray bus. I'm just glad I wasn't trapped on a bus with loads of rich 18 year olds from Surrey.
Both companies go to pretty much the same places and Kiwi Experience also do a 'unique' stay at a Maori lodge and a stay at an isolated farm. Whichever one you pick I'm sure you'll have a good time.
Overall it was a great experience but to improve Stray should be more realistic about the advertised flexibility - lots of people were left in the lurch because they believed what they'd been sold. Some of our drivers were just rubbish too, but others were fantastic.
“A Great way to discover New Zealand when you travel solo :D”
I had an AMAZING Stray experience!! I really loved the concept and I loved everything! I was so lucky to have on my bus GREAT people and to have also Nat as a driver!
We were 18 persons for the 1st 5 days from 12 different nationalities and aged between 18 and 69 years old ! We simply matched so well! We had a lot of fun and the places visited give you a very good overview of the north of the country which beautiful in my opinion! Accommodation were perfect! The best was in Hahei! The activities offered are various and if you don't want to do it it's up to you! You can choose to do something else instead! The bus was very confortable and Nat our driver was the BEST ever! She was so nice and always smiling and very helpful! I would definitely recommend Stray to anyone who is going to travel solo as it is very convenient and perfect to meet people! And I definitely want to go back and do the South Stray experience!!
“The ONLY way to travel New Zealand”
Travelled with Stray around the North Island not long ago and it was quite possibly the best experience I've ever had. Having backpacked around Australia and South East Asia by myself, the ease and convenience of jumping on a tour like this was evident from day 1. The Driver Guide was informative, helped me (and the entire bus) book accommodation, activities but also took us on heaps of free activities too - the days were jam packed! We also got into super remote places i would never have seen/even thought of hadnt it been for Stray - best trip EVER!
“Amazing experience!!!”
I am a very independent traveler and never buy package tours so I was initially reluctant to go with Stray. After talking to few backpacker who unanimously recommended their service and I decided to give it a try.
OMG! I have met so many great people on a bus and shared some amazing memories!!! Stray drivers are super friendly and helpful. They will go out of their way to help you out/advise on what places to go to/activities to embrace. They will be honest with you if they know that something is not worth your time or money.
Booking system (both online and via phone) is very user-friendly so they really make sure that you vacation time is stressfree :)
I am already planning on coming back to NZ and I will definitely use Stray services then!
“An amazing way to see New Zealand”
Stray drivers put alot of effort into making the journey easy.
To get the most from your trip you need to stop off at various points to do the activities available.
Blue Duck Station was our favorite.
“I'm not a bus tour person - but I loved this”
I had never been on an organised tour in my life so had to be convinced. But am glad I did! There is enough freedom, time to yourself, choice, pay or not pay and conversely you make friends, feel included no matter the age, get to see and feel NZ, enjoy the bus drivers' company. We are a couple in our mid 30s so at the older end of the age scale but I don't think it makes a difference.
I also rate Stray as tour company, having worked in Tourism myself. Professional yet relaxed and never condescending. Cheers!
