The Great Coast Road
Punakaiki's claim to fame is Dolomite Point, where a layering-weathering process called stylobedding has carved the limestone into what looks like piles…
Nowhere is solitude sweeter than on the West Coast. A few marvels pull big crowds – like Franz Josef and Fox Glaciers, and the magnificent Pancake Rocks – but you'll need jetboats, helicopter rides and tramping trails to explore its inner realms. Hemmed in by the Southern Alps and the savage Tasman Sea, the West Coast forms almost 9% of the land area of New Zealand (NZ) but contains less than 1% of its population.
The Great Coast Road
Punakaiki's claim to fame is Dolomite Point, where a layering-weathering process called stylobedding has carved the limestone into what looks like piles…
Buller Region
Every gold-rush town needs a still, and Reefton's got a goodie in the form of this operation that makes use of foraged botanicals and spring water sourced…
Westland Tai Poutini National Park
On a good day, the famous 'mirror lake' reflects extraordinary views of distant Aoraki/Mt Cook and Mt Tasman in its forest-shaded waters. The best time to…
Buller Region
It's almost an hour's walk each way from Kōhaihai along the beginning of the Heaphy Track and over the hill to Scotts Beach – a wild, empty shoreline…
Buller Region
Six hundred metres above sea level, Denniston was once NZ's largest coal town, with 1500 residents in 1911. By 1981 there were eight. Its claim to fame…
Buller Region
Remote Waiuta is one of the West Coast's most famous ghost towns. Spread over a plateau, this once-burgeoning gold town was swiftly abandoned after the…
The West Coast
Lying at the heart of a 7000-hectare scenic reserve, 18km southeast of Hokitika, beautiful Lake Kaniere is 8km long, 2km wide, up to 195m deep, and…
The West Coast
Water this turqouise doesn't come easily. Half a million years of glacial movement sculpted Hokitika's ravine; the rock 'flour' ground over millennia…
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