Australia & New Zealand, the same but different……

My first ever big trip away from home was to New Zealand back in 2003, I fell in love with this country and my wife and have been back and forward multiple times since.

Me at the Great Barrier reef in my younger days!

I’ve also travelled in Australia on a few different holidays and keep going back there as well.

With Cunard announcing the relocation of Queen Elizabeth over that way next year I thought I’d give my unique take on these two incredible destinations.

Australians are very different to Kiwis and vice versa and the culture of the countries are as different as the landscapes and because they are both new countries they have changed and evolved quite quickly.

The two places vary in culture, more than you might think, the brash, confident Aussies alongside the original Aboriginal culture. Then you have the more reserved Kiwi “pakeha” (the Maori term for Europeans) in NZ and the strong, proud Maori who seem to all scrub along pretty well together.

It’s a fascinating mix and once you’ve lived out there or even been out there for a while you start to understand the nuances a bit better. Having been up to Auckland in NZ a lot and Brisbane a few times as well as Melbourne in Australia all of these cities are a melting pot for the Micronesian, Melanesian and indeed Pacific islander cultures as well. So it’s not all Crocodile Dundee types wandering around in most of the cities of Australia (OK maybe in some parts) there is much more to Australian culture than this and chucking another shrimp on the barbie.

Both countries like to claim each other’s own cultural contributions and innovations and very often there is a hoopla about some such thing. These points of contention include Pavlova (meringue based dessert), Crowded House, Phar Lap (a racehorse born in Timaru NZ Im reliably informed but it did race in Australia just like my pet greyhound Marko) the flat white coffee and Russell Crowe. These are all hotly disputed….. although Russell Crowe I just added out of sheer bemusement actually as why would you not claim an Oscar winner? He is NZ born but for some reason Kiwis claim he is Australian, maybe because he owns the Aussie Rabbitohs Rugby team and has been in Neighbours or maybe just his former reputation for a bad temper, pass…??

Talking of rugby, both countries have long since been very happy to claim ANY pacific islander who can play rugby, netball or even tiddlywinks a bit. Jonah Lomu for example was really born in Tonga and the list includes many great All Blacks and Wallabies. On the NZ side many would probably assume were Maori because they can do a half decent haka (Pacific islanders do this too so not so hard for them to blend in actually..). England seemingly have learned this little loophole recently with some of their player so maybe I shouldn’t comment, alas there are no hakas to be seen at Twickenham yet unless the All Blacks are playing….

I would encourage anyone who goes to Australia and NZ not to just go to the sky tower in Auckland or the Opera house in Sydney but to get out and hunt out the real local cultures.

Me having a glass of champagne before Sounds of Silence star gazing at Uluru, NT Australia

The red centre of Australia is an amazing place to see, a big barren desert in some ways, yes but I would highly recommend a trip to Alice Springs as well as Uluru (Ayers Rock) and anywhere in between for the infinite Red Centre star gazing alone.  Also the aforementioned Crocodile Dundee types are more likely to be met here at some of the slightly random outback pubs!

The landscape in the Red centre is totally different to anywhere you would find in NZ in the same way that the thermal activity, geysers and volcanic lakes at Rotorua are unique to NZ along with the Himalayan sized alps on the south island. These sort of things along with Hobbiton from Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit, just up the road from Rotorua and probably the cheapest skydiving in a first world country at Taupo make the North Island of NZ just as attractive a proposition as the immense scenery on the south island.

The characters you find in these places are always more colourful as well and you tend to get more interesting local landmarks like the lines of wellies or bras hung up on fences by the side of the road in NZ  for no particular reason. There is also an artistic toilet in Northland, NZ at a town called Kawakawa by an Austrian artist Hundertwasser which is all slightly surreal and unusual. These sort of memories maketh a holiday I reckon, perhaps more so than going up another phallic shaped tower!

the colourful Hunderwasser toilets at Kawakawa, Northland

random old bikes next to the side of the road on West coast NZ pictured

In my opinion Auckland (NZs biggest city but not the capital, that’s Wellington) is just a miniature version of Sydney, albeit less hyped and slightly cheaper and easier to navigate. It has the same landmarks (sky tower and harbour bridge) and the same big city attitudes as the “big smoke” in Sydney as well. Its worth seeing but maybe it’s not that rewarding to see both if you have done one of them already and both are lacking the character of some of the smaller towns in my opinion.

My personal all-time favourite place in New Zealand is the West coast and Fiordland national park in particular, this is where you can go from beach to glaciers in minutes. At Fiordland cruises tend to get to a lot of places down here that you couldn’t access from a land based holiday like Dusky Sound which isn’t accessible by a public road and Doubtful Sound which is quite an expensive organised day trip only excursion, which involves a ferry crossing and 4x4s to get there! .

Milford Sound, Fiordland National Park on a nice day, its just as good on a rainy day as there are lots of waterfalls!

Strangely you also get the almost wild west themed outback style pubs here too which is always interesting, Ross an old gold mining town on the west coast for example has a cracker.

I’ve been lucky enough to be able to live and travel in New Zealand and travel Australia in every way imaginable so feel blessed and would promote these too familiar but different destinations to us Brits. Either way both Australia and New Zealand have sights and experiences that are truly an indispensable part of any bucket list or bucket list itinerary.