I'm curious to know what people wish they'd known before they went on their trips, and only discovered afterwords...

For example,
Did you miss something in a town you wish you'd known about?
Did you pack something, and never used it?
Did you need something you didn't pack and had to go in search of it?

In particular, looking for different advice to what is already available on the board...share you experience so others can learn from you 'mistake'.

Thanks

Don't do the Seal safari..waste of money

Black water rafting, skydiving, luge, skyline restaurant, white water rafting, jetboat, parasailing etc were all awesome

I'm glad that I went
-black water rafting
-white water rafting
-skydiving
-parasailing
-mad dog boarding
-did the village tour

I could've done without
-jet boating (waste of money, and not that thrilling)
-the haka dinner (very expensive for what it was, if u have time go and see a cultural performance at the museum in auckland as it is much more interesting)

I'm glad that I
-didnt go on the luge (good time to spend looking around rotoroua)
-pack too many clothes
-go out too much, but allowed a couple of quite nights on tour for the adventurous activities the following day
-spent the day in wellington to explore the city instead of doing optional activities

I wish
-I hadn't left my smelly shoes outside my room, as they were stolen (very expensive walking shoes)
-I had taken more money to spend and had accounted for the little extras (drinking, souvenirs, doing more optional activities that I hadnt planned on doing)

Ashlie -

if you don't mind me asking, how much did you take?

I'm booked on the grand adventurer starting the 29th of December and I *should have* enough money on my credit card to pay for the optionals I want to do (I've gone through and priced my optionals... yes, I'm a nerd) plus I'm taking *hopefully* two grand. I'll be in Auckland 2 nights before and Christchurch two nights after the contiki finishes.

I think this will be enough.... but I'm sooo worried about running out of money!

Wish I would have taken my purse I use at home. I had a small "backpack", but it was dumb at the bars, though convienent the rest of the time. Wish I would have only taken 1 pair of tennis/hiking shoes - I took 2 and it was extra weight. Should have used that space to back more bar/pub tops to wear(I had to wear my old sweatshirts)

Glad I had a gore-tex coat (went in Aug)

Thought the quad bikes in Wellington was way over-priced, if you have to do the 8 am trip you're better off sleeping in and catching up on sleep than spending the $165 on it. Afternoon trip might be ok - better than wasting time in Wellington. Wish I wouldnt' have done the Bay of Islands Dolphin Cruise - didn't see any dolphins - if the weather is bad don't do this option or verify w/ the boat co that dolphins have been spotted.

Glad I did it:
Black water rafting, Zorbing, luge, all the optional dinners (a blast!), white water rafting, Polynesian spa (not a contiki optional), Rocks and Ropes, jetboat (though I hear Huka falls was better than the Queenstown one I did), paragliding off Coronet Peak in QT (not a Contiki optional - found on my own), bungee jump, stayed out too late and drank too much almost nightly,

Also very glad I bought the ginger pills in Paihia for the rest of the trip - the roads are very curvy and plenty of people got motion sickness!

Explorer - which one is the white water rafting in the optionals? I see a few rafting ones, is there one in particular that was really good or were they all good?
Also, where did you do the Polynesian spa? Thanks for your help!

About those smelly shoes... If you bring a couple fabric softener sheets you can stick them and it should help. Better then having them stolen.

yeah definitely decide what activities you want to do and what you can afford before you leave.

don't do the zorb thingy, or the wellington tour.

dinners and drinks end up costing a lot more than you think.

take a nice big memory card for your camera i ran out of space a few times and had to go find an internet cafe to burn my images to cd.

Polynesian spa was right next to the motel in Rotorua. I went at about 9:30 pm - they stay open til 11 at least.

White Water - did it in Queenstown - Kawarua (sp) river (the grade 3) it was good - not big rapids and we stayed in the boat, for my first time white water rafting. A couple guys did the shotover (i belive that is what it is called) river in QT - grade 4 and 5 rapids - they got tipped over out of the boat twice. One girl (not from Contiki) got caught up in a swell under the boat when they tipped so that is definately for strong swimmers. The guys did the triple challange for it - shotover jet, helicopter ride tehn the rapids - they thought the helicopter ride was awesome.

Yes dinners and drinks do cost more than you plan on - most of the time drinks were $7 NZ, which considering that is about $5 US they were quite reasonable and there were some 2 for 1's. I'm not a big drinker at home, but at contiki I probably spent a minimum $50 NZ per night on drinks. I went w/ about $700 NZ dollars ($500 US) in cash I used basically all of that for drinks/meals/snacks, souveniers/optionals and other stuff I put on credit card. I did have to get another $100 of NZ dollars in cash while there - most was for a tip for the driver and tour mgr though.
You can do dinners/lunches fairly reasonably if you are on a strict budget. Other than the optional dinners I think the most expensive one I did was Chinese in Wellington - we went as a group for about $30 NZ each.

Do the Zorb though - it's cool as it is the original zorb and while maybe a bit pricey for a couple minute ride it is good fun!

the activities is a big one... and also pack light if u wont wear 3 pairs of jeans for instance only take 2. wear one and wash one... there are plenty of washing facitlites and i found i thought i packed lightly but i still didnt wear alot of stuff...

oh and shezl, your answer in repsonse to christchurch. when you get there goto the information centre in the city centre (in the square) and try and organise a tour or something, i spent 2 days in chrischurch also but didnt organise anything and me and my friend found we were really bored just looking over the inner city. there is not really much to do once you have seen it once.

I wish i had taken my hair straighner....

I wish i had flown into Taupo earlier, same with BOI. Wellington was boring and windy as, which i hated.
Christchurch, nothing to do really in the city i found. I did a wine tour which was nice.

i wish i didnt take my big tolietry bag, took up a lot of room.

Wish i hadnt got the flu while i was there. After calling the travel insurance pple, I rang home and cried to mum coz i felt absolutelly miserable due to the flu and was home sick as a result of that and the fact that it was ruining my holiday, coz i already had 2 flu's in the previous month!

Im very glad that I did the Tamaki Maori dinner and village experience. We had the most hilarious driver, a maori driver who on the way there, got us to like drive a war canoe and pick a chief to be met by the villagers, and on the way back, he called out countries and you had to sing a national song. thank god he didnt say australia coz i was the only aussie and i cant sing. He said that if we didnt sing he'd pull the bus over and ud have to get out lol. When some singaporians didnt sing he did that and that was pretty funny. And he got us singing 'she'll be coming round the mountain' and the next thing we know, we are going around a roundabout several times and he's blowing the horn heaps hehehe. he joked that he got police friends who let him do this hehe. But it was a great experience, and very hm moving and scary at times.
You get told at teh start that when you are welcomed, you are to stand perfectly still, do not smile or smirk or even whisper as its a sign of disprect. They said that about 2 tiems on the bus and once at the place, and this chinese lady from another bus, as soon as they started she ran to the back, and one of the ladies who welcomed us, took her out the back, to where we came in and you could hear the chinese woman yelling. so rude! Dont think she was allowed to stay...good!!!

Im glad i did the day in the bay cruise in the bay of islands, though im not happy that halfway through i got really seasick and was close to throwing up. It was a nice day on the water, calm and stuff until we got to the more exposed parts and the boat got bumpy then. we were meant to do a dolphin swim, but we were heading back and it didnt look like we'd even see them. There were heaps of boats out on the bay and we'd be in radio contact all day to see if anyone saw any.
As we were nearly back there, with like 30mins left out of the 8hr trip, someone on our boat spotted a pod with babies and we went straight away. they stopped teh boat, and within 10mins you could see a lot of other boats like literally speeding to get up to where we were lol. it was hilarious. So yeah that cured my seasickness for a bit, and i couldnt help grinning for the rest of the afternoon. I felt sick and like i was still on the boat for a few hours afterwards but it was a fantastic trip

I wish i'd taken more going out tops, a nice pair of trainers or flat shoes and my proper going out make up! Just got back and had the best time ever even though I didn't have these things!