Help needed with itinerary for Southern Island, New Zealand

There are some people on the forum, including me, that have been to New Zealand. However, not a lot. If you don't get enough info, I highly recommend the group New Zealand Travel Tips. A woman in New Zealand started it, there is a website and a facebook page. MANY people that live in New Zealand are active on the Facebook page. There are also many discounts available. I wished I had found the group much sooner in my travel planning. NZTT has gotten so big that she has employees and there is some consulting available. Further, if you have an problems during your planning and when you are in New Zealand, I have seen many offers of help.

We barely "cracked" the south island. My opinion is that you are moving around too much, especially if you like "slow" travel. I didn't stay in some of the places you are visiting.I like the number of days you have in Te Anau, though you may want one more. I think 3 nights in Wanaka would be enough. YOu might want another day in Picton/Nelson, especially if you plan any wine tasting. We were so surprised at how interesting Oamaru was. I'd suggest at least one more night. The Steampunk museum was interesting. We didn't even get to go inside, as it was closed, but there was so much outside that we got a taste. We enjoyed watching the penguins come in at night.

Agree with the previous poster that the New Zealand travel tips group on Facebook is the way to go. That's how I planned my trip.

We did a similar trip a few years ago. Depending on your interests, maybe you can cut some days from Queenstow/Wanaka. You could add Whariki Beach. We spent one night at the Holiday Park. The bathrooms were yucky and luckily we brought food we could have for dinner. It was worth it to walk across the fields to the beach to see the sea lion pups in the tide pools. (We're from southern California and usually not thrilled about seeing sea lions in other places!). We didn't spend any time in Christchurch but spent our last 3 nights in Akaroa and then dropped the car at Christchurch airport. We started our trip in Wellington (flew from Melbourne, Aus) and took the ferry to Picton. Then we stayed at Lochmara Lodge for 3 nights (loved it!) before picking up a rental car by the ferry office.

Forgot to mention that we loved the overnight Doubtful Sound cruise. We also did the Milford Sound day cruise which was okay, but not many waterfalls because they hadn't had much rain.

It's been about six years since we went to New Zealand -- one week on the north island and two weeks on the south island. I'm jealous of the time that you have planned there!

We also stayed several nights in TeAnau and did boat trips on both Milford Sound and Doubtful Sound. One thing that worked out well for us is that it rained a lot on our trip to Milford (lots and lots of waterfalls) so we went back a couple days later and took another boat trip in the sunshine. Enjoyed both experiences.

TripAdvisor has a relatively active New Zealand South Island forum that you might also check.

We just returned from about 2 weeks on the south island. We stayed in Te Anau 3 nights, and did both Doubtful Sound and Milford Sound. I highly recommend staying at the Te Anau Lodge. It was previously a convent built in the 1930s, and has beautiful wood decorations. The manager was delightful, and it is on a large piece of property with fun activities -- ping pong in a glass garden house, large chess set on the lawn. And we walked to amazing restaurants about a mile away. The lodge manager made recommendations and reservations for us.

Thank you all so much for the quick responses. They are so helpful. I have requested to join the New Zealand Travel Tips group as suggested and I look forward to being able to check that out. I had posted my itinerary on both the fodors.com/forums and tripadvisor forums but got very few responses which surprised me. So thank you all for these very helpful suggestions.

How exciting to have so much time to enjoy the South Island! I was lucky enough to spend two months in NZ in 2023 - one month for the North Island and one month for the South - and had so much fun.

Looking over your draft itinerary, the first 6 nights seem like they'll be very busy with lots of moving around. Do you have an option to fly into Picton or Nelson instead of Christchurch? Since you'll be back in Christchurch at the end of the trip, it feels unnecessary to be there twice if you could fly into one of the other destinations. Nelson is so laid back and pleasant that it would be the perfect place to get over jetlag. I absolutely loved the B&B I stayed at there: https://ahhouse.co.nz/. I was there both before and after hiking the Abel Tasman Coast Track and the owner was so kind - he even offered to do my laundry!

If you can find a way to spend a night or two in Akaroa, I'd highly recommend it. It's a beautiful area and very different to the other areas you're visiting. I'm a keen gardener so especially loved visiting Fishermans Bay garden (https://www.fishermansbay.nz/), which has the most spectacular setting.

We did 3 weeks on the South Island last year focusing on the Southern Alps and Fiordland. I had been there briefly a long time previously.
Looking at your plans it looks pretty good.
March is a good choice for weather although probably pretty busy tourism wise.
We are low budget travellers and travelled in a campervan staying mostly at powered sites.
We had a brilliant trip.
You are hitting up most of the places we visited.
Arthur's Pass is probably the only one missing that was a highlight for us but probably doesn't work for you. You can't see everything but you certainly are seeing plenty.

Agree, with the above. We really liked the drive and spending some time in Arthur's Pass

Thank you all so so much! Your responses are so helpful and give me more things to think about. Thanks so much for the BnB recommendation in Nelson. Not sure if we can fly there but I will check that. We love BnBs when we travel.