Ultimate New Zealand Hiking Trips: Experience Kiwi-Style Tramping at its Best

Louis Davidson guides our Ultimate New Zealand trips. He’s here to help you figure out whether hiking Kiwi-style is right for you.

So what is a Kiwi-style hiking trip?

Our Kiwi-style trips are grounded in the unique context of New Zealand’s rich tramping heritage, a term meaning trekking or overnight hiking here in Aotearoa New Zealand.

We tour north to south stepping out into the backcountry on a series of tramps. The days between are for shorter adventures, hot and cold swims, and getting a taste of Kiwi life. It’s a way of travelling shaped by a tramping culture that has always been rooted in simplicity and self-reliance. Decades roll by and the ethos stays the same: bring what you need, leave no trace, help each other out.

We embrace this particularly egalitarian culture of our backcountry. It does not matter what you do for a living, where you come from, or how old you are. Hiking in the mountains brings challenge for some and ease for others. Being supportive, friendly, and encouraging to our fellow travellers and people we meet along the trail is vital to a good experience. That’s the spirit that carries our trips. One guide, a small group, and everyone pitching in. Shared effort, shared reward – or as we say in New Zealand, do the mahi (work), get the treats!

Let me take you to a dawn moment from one of our trips…

Hook-beaked fighter jets

A raucous screech cuts through a dawn chorus of caffeinated hikers’ chatter. On the hut deck, eyes lift from bowls, sporks hovering mid-air as we scan the morning sky for kākā, our endangered forest parrot.

Then they come.

Silhouettes sweep the treeline. Crimson underwings flash as steady wingbeats bear down on us, and we are treated to parrot aerobatics in the forested amphitheatre by the hut. Then they’re gone. Later, someone likens it to a flyover of hook-beaked fighter jets - a perfect description. 

This was a special moment to share with our group. I can remember a time when kākā were rare, but with sustained conservation efforts, hoons of kākā (the brilliant collective noun) are a far more common sight in our wilderness now.

Before we depart, we sweep the hut floors and tip the mattresses on edge to air (these trips stay in some backcountry huts without wardens and you rely on the last people to keep the hut ship-shape), then we shoulder our packs and trundle off down-valley chatting and snacking. Laughs and time stretch on this endless summer day. Whirinaki Rainforest is one of New Zealand’s best-kept secrets and we see no other people as we explore this ‘living cathedral’.

Near the road end, some of us plunge into the river. It’s a fitting end to a glorious day on the trail. Evening returns us to creature comforts and we gather around the BBQ to muse away the last of the daylight.

If this resonated with you, you’re in the right place. This is hiking Kiwi-style.

Aotearoa New Zealand: No finer place

The late conservationist Shaun Barnett, a friend to many of us, said in his book Tramping, a New Zealand History:

“There is no finer place to tramp than New Zealand. It has some of the most striking scenery on the planet, the world’s best hut and track network, a small population, no dangerous wild animals, poisonous snakes or toxic spiders, and good access.”

The backcountry here has a purity to it. Our vast national parks are strictly parks, and few items of civilisation are allowed to linger.  There are no cars, no cows, no cafés, and you won’t hear engines (except maybe the odd water taxi or helicopter). Out here, you find tranquillity, separation, and the sense that these places are nearly the same now as before humans arrived in Aotearoa just 800 years ago.

When you join one of our Kiwi-style trips, you are going to experience these wilderness citadels. Quite simply, we go to a lot of places no other company does.

You’re not a tourist, you’re a tramper

There’s something satisfying about working as a crew. It breaks the ice, gets people talking, and gives the trip a rhythm. You’ll take turns cooking dinner, setting up tents, collecting firewood, and doing the dishes. When you’re cooking dinner by headtorch or drying socks by a hut fire, you’re not a tourist, you’re a tramper.

Slow down and engage with nature, listen to your guide tell stories of the land and its people, swim in the rivers, chew the horopito (or mountain pepper tree) leaves, taste the honey dew, and sleep under the stars – these are our treasures. We have a belief that to truly care for the environment, we need to be fascinated and in awe of it. This means running trips that move a bit slower and respect the places we visit, not merely passing through in a bus looking for the perfect shot.

At Hiking New Zealand we embrace kaitiakitanga, the Māori principle meaning guardianship of our natural world. Our sister company Southern Rewilding focuses on environmental restoration, and with many guides working in both worlds, Aotearoa’s remarkable conservation story is woven into the way we travel.

When I guide these trips, I often feel as though I’m on an adventure with a group of friends (albeit with an outsized share of the admin!) and other trampers we meet often assume we are just that. It makes for the kind of memories (mostly!) you find yourself talking about for years.

Creature comforts

Of course, we add a few extras. Comfy transport, hearty meals, and ‘civilisation’ nights with hot showers, cold drinks, comfortable beds, Wi-Fi, and somewhere to wash your clothes. These simple pleasures feel all the richer for the steps you’ve walked to reach them.

You’re in safe hands

Every journey calls for a steady hand at the helm and that’s your guide. Think of them as the mastermind behind the scenes, keeping the adventure on track. They are your weather watcher, river-level monitor, safety keeper, driver, reservation wizard, and they make sure all the essential gear, including chocolate, is good to go. They’ll even show you how to set up your tent, but they are only human and will need your help!

So, if you’re up for something real, a bit muddy, stunningly beautiful, and Kiwi as it comes, book yourself onto one of our Ultimate trips. You can expect to have fun; you are on holiday after all.

Words by Louis Davidson

Key Information for the Ultimate New Zealand (24 Days)