Events

Rugby World Cup 2011 will be a chance to experience and relive New Zealand’s rich rugby heritage with a series of REAL New Zealand Festival nostalgic exhibitions and events surrounding the tournament.

The last of the tickets for Rugby World Cup 2011 have gone on sale and are going quickly as New Zealand continues to ramp up preparations for hosting the major event.

Kiwis across New Zealand are talking up their language and hospitality skills as they join in the annual Māori Language Week (4 – 10 July 2011).

A New Zealand homecoming that’s been 130 years in the making will see a famous wharenui or carved meeting house returned to its rightful place in one of the most significant Māori cultural happenings of modern times.

Skiers and snowboarders are clapping their gloved hands and kicking up their snow boots – kei te heke te hukapapa (it is snowing) and the New Zealand ski season is underway.

The ‘Robertson Promised Gift’ – a private art collection owned by billionaire New Zealand luxury lodge owners, the Robertson family – is to go on show for the first time at the newly refurbished Auckland Art Gallery.

On 14 July 1789 the people of Paris stormed the Bastille and now, 221 years later, the French are coming to do battle in Queenstown.

Sirocco, the rare New Zealand kākāpo parrot whose frisky behaviour with a BBC television crew propelled him to global stardom, will make some cameo appearances during Rugby World Cup.

The best of Kiwi music will sound throughout the country during the Rugby World Cup when 50 top bands play 22 different cities as part of a REAL New Zealand Music Showcase tour.

New Zealand's southern winter slopes are a-buzz with high adrenalin activity as international snow and ice sports stars take their places for the second 100% Pure New Zealand Winter Games.