I am going to visit a client in Sydney/Melbourne, Australia the the end of February/beginning of March. Since I'll be making the long haul to get there, I've decided to take an extra week+ off for R&R. Flights can take me through either Fiji or New Zealand. Any recommendations, opinions on which I should try? I have never been in this part of the world and haven't done much research, so all input is greatly welcomed!
i've never been to either, so i don't have any input. i just wanted to say that if you choose fiji i will be insane with jealousy. i've always always wanted to go there.
I spent a semester in Australia (Brisbane, to be exact, but we travelled all over) and on the way back my friends and I spent two weeks in New Zealand. We went to 11 cities in 14 days, which was a little exhausting, so I wouldn't recommend doing that, but I would recommend going to New Zealand and traveling around the South Island. I think there's just more to do on the South Island, even though it's bigger, so there's more driving required. You should be able to get flights in/out of Christchurch just as easily as you can in/out of Auckland.
While we were on the South Island, we went to the Franz Josef glacier and did glacier hiking. It was awesome. We were supposed to take a helicopter to the top and hike down, but the weather was bad so we couldn't do the helicopter part. We went horseback riding in a little town somewhere (can't remember) and then spent 3 days in Queenstown, which is pretty much the adventure sport capital of the world. My friends went bungee jumping, there's skydiving, I went hang gliding, and we all went canyoning, which is illegal in the US. It's basically rapelling down these canyons and then swimming/hiking/rapelling through a river in a canyon. Very cool, but kinda dangerous. Queenstown is very cool and there are a TON of young people there, just traveling around. It's gorgeous too, in fact, all of the South Island is beautiful. Very much like the scenery in the Lord of the Rings movies, just without the elves and stuff.
NZ is very much how I imagine the US was back in the 50's. It's quaint, with a lot of small towns, and things are just very simple there. Like there was a period of time we went three days in which there was no place around that took a credit/debit card. The people there were all VERY nice too and we met some awesome people from all over the world when we were on our tour bus.
In short, I think if you want rest and relaxation and soaking in the sun, you'll want Fiji. If you want some adventure, traveling, and sightseeing, then NZ.
Also, when we were in Australia, we went to Sydney and Melbourne and pretty much all over the place, so if you want recommendations of stuff to do around there, just let me know!
ETA: Zeitgeist4 is right about the general things to do in each of those places. New Zealand doesn't really have a "happening" night life, but there are tons of small bars and pubs. Australia has just about everything you could be interested in from small bars and pubs, to major clubs and whatnot.
Also, FWIW, although I liked Sydney, it seemed very much like just another big city to me. There's cool stuff to do there, but Melbourne has a lot more personality and it's a BEAUTIFUL city.
Thanks for the information gals! It is really hard to decide! I love adventure sports, so it sounds like NZ might be the best choice, but in the next three months, I have 5 major week+ trips planned for work (Nice, Australia, Las Vegas, Hawaii, Atlanta) and an int'l client coming to my town to visit, so I could probably also use a week of just lying on the beach doing nothing!
Any recommendations for places to stay in New Zealand, Australia or Fiji?
I spent a ton of time in Australia, but I'm no help really on places to stay, since we stayed at hostels most of the time. There's a good Hilton in Sydney that I stayed at one night and if you go to Brisbane at all, I'd recommend the Sheraton downtown. My parents stayed there a few nights, as did my roommate who drunkenly thought that staying at the Sheraton was more cost effective than taking a cab home.
If you're going to do the hostel thing, New Zealand had some great places. A lot of family run, little inn-like places. We stayed at a hostel called Bumbles when we were in Queenstown and I remember it being nice.
Also, if you end up choosing to go to NZ, definitely bring a light rain jacket and some warm clothes. We went in December, when it was blazing hot in Australia, but NZ was MUCH colder.