Story Angles

To many New Zealanders, the custard square rates right up there with the pavlova as a classic Kiwi icon.

In the Southern Alps of the South Island, a clownish colourful native parrot called the kea performs antics that can be both alarming and amusing.

Muriwai, a surf beach on the west coast of Auckland, is around 60 kilometres and extends into a regional park of around 8 kilometres.

Not far from Auckland, New Zealand’s most populous city, a sanctuary has been set up on Tiritiri Matangi Island. Volunteers have spent years replanting the native vegetation on the island and several species of endangered native birds have been successfully established.

The kakapo is a fascinating ground-dwelling parrot whose numbers have been decimated by predators such as stoats, cats, rats and dogs.

Taranaki is renowned for its fabulous gardens of roses, rhododendrons, fuchsias and native plants.

Wai-o-tapu is a unique geothermal area located in the centre of the Taupo volcanic zone.

Franz Josef is not your average glacier – it is a 12km long, 7000-year-old body of ice sliding down a mountain valley into a rainforest.

Jane Hunter of Hunters Wines and Michelle Richardson of Villa Maria Estate are two New Zealand women at the pinnacle of achievement in the wine industry.

Hell's Gate and Wai Ora Spa, Tikitere is a unique place of extreme contrasts. Visitors walk past steaming fumeroles and pools of boiling mud so violent they are unnerving.