New Zealand 8-Day Tours & Itineraries

Explore 5 trips designed by local kimkim specialists to get ideas for your trip to New Zealand.
See our itineraries below or read our guide to the best 8-day trips in New Zealand.
Plan your trip to New Zealand
Chat with a local specialist who can help organize your trip.
Rotorua
Map of Self-Drive New Zealand: The North Island Bucket List - 8 Days
Self-Drive New Zealand: The North Island Bucket List - 8 Days

Experience the highlights of New Zealand's North Island on this 8-day self-drive adventure from Auckland to Wellington. Explore national parks and hot springs, see real Hobbit homes, and immerse yourself in the rich indigenous culture and history. This journey includes many options for an adrenaline rush, as well as relaxing spa treatments to unwind and rejuvenate. This is the best way to see the North Island at your own pace!

Franz Josef Glacier
Map of New Zealand Self-Drive Tour: Auckland, Rotorua, Christchurch, Franz Joseph & Queenstown - 8 Days
New Zealand Self-Drive Tour: Auckland, Rotorua, Christchurch, Franz Joseph & Queenstown - 8 Days

Explore the highlights of New Zealand's North and South Islands on this self-drive adventure. Start in cosmopolitan Auckland before passing by the expansive cave system of Waitomo on your way to Rotorua. Here, you'll visit Tolkien's "Shire" and dip in thermal pools. Then, you'll fly over to South Island, where you'll drive yourself around Christchurch, explore the Glacier Region, and end in Queenstown, the adventure capital of the world.

You'll drive alongside striking turquoise Lake Tekapo on the South Island
Map of Self-Drive New Zealand: Lakes, Mountains & Glaciers - 8 Days
Self-Drive New Zealand: Lakes, Mountains & Glaciers - 8 Days

Explore the beauty of New Zealand's South Island at your own pace with this self-drive tour. You'll start in Christchurch and drive through incredible villages to Queenstown. Next, you'll explore breathtaking national parks before taking one of the world's greatest train journeys back to Christchurch. Get your adrenaline rush in along the way by bungee jumping, heli-skiing, and mountain biking!

Enjoy a two-hour boat cruise across Milford Sound
Map of A Taste of New Zealand: Queenstown, Wellington, Rotorua & Auckland  - 8 Days
A Taste of New Zealand: Queenstown, Wellington, Rotorua & Auckland - 8 Days

For those that like a trip to include thrills, food, and natural wonders, this eight-day itinerary should check off all the boxes. New Zealand is known for its hospitality, and you'll experience the very best of it at a mountaintop farm, a lakeside spa, and a multicourse Maori feast. Along the way, you'll get to see a fjord from a plane, glowworms from a boat, and Wellington's cityscape from a century-old funicular railway.

Wellington's iconic century-old furnicular
Map of New Zealand North Island Road Trip: Auckland to Wellington - 8 Days
New Zealand North Island Road Trip: Auckland to Wellington - 8 Days

See the North Island from top to bottom on this eight-day New Zealand road trip. Get to know the "City of Sails" in Auckland, then set out into the rainforests of Waitakere and the lush farmland of Waikato. Visit Hobbit houses in the real Middle-earth and venture into glowworm-illuminated caves, then follow the smell of sulfur to Rotorua and its geothermal wonders. After hiking to the dormant volcanoes of Tongariro National Park, end your adventure among the quirky urban charm of Wellington.

Other durations: 5 days · 6 days · 7 days · 8 days · 9 days · 10 days · 11 days · 12 days · 13 days · 14 days · 15 days · 21 days