Emily Writes lists the essential items you need for your family holiday. Packing to go on summer holiday is an art and a scientific problem. It involves using both sides of the brain. An emotional and intellectual operation that can make or break your summer. If you’re going on a summer holiday don’t let the … Read more
After lockdown, Leisha Jones and her family packed up the car and started driving south from Auckland, with no real agenda other than to escape. What ensued was an enriching, and delicious, reintroduction to this great nation’s cuisine. A few years ago, I took a course in New Zealand wine to become a more educated … Read more
As New Zealanders await the end of alert level four and the chance to escape their homes, some are in such scenic lockdown refuges they won’t want to leave. Every morning, the 11 residents at the Lake Tekapo Holiday Park wake up to silence. It’s dense and thorough – the kind that presses on your … Read more
Yes, it’s still summer and, en route to that final festival or beach bolt-hole, the season of the road trip. Here Spinoff Art co-editor Mark Amery runs down some of the best North Island contemporary art stopovers, and the mavericks behind them. We cross the Cook Strait next year, promise. Back in 2000 Gregory Burke … Read more
Summer journeys: In the final of a special travel writing series, playwright and novelist Renée reflects on the past and ponders her future on an evocative drive up the East Coast. The Spinoff Summer Journey series is entirely funded by The Spinoff Members. For more about becoming a member and supporting The Spinoff’s journalism, click here. I know … Read more
From the deep south to the top of the north, The Spinoffers spread our culinary wings to sample regional delights galore over the summer break. Here’s what we can’t stop thinking about. FAR NORTH: PIE TIME ‘Twas a morning of a good ol’ wake and bake in the fa far north where my squad and … Read more
A stream of overseas visitors has shown me how the NZ tourism industry needs to encourage more environmentally friendly behaviour, writes Jai Breitnauer. “If you don’t want them, I guess just chuck them out,” my friend told me, gesturing to the pile of stuff on the deck. “That’s what we would have had to do … Read more
Finally, the definitive ranking of Aotearoa’s favourite snack – featuring notes of burnt marshmallow, wet undies and duplicitous giraffes. This post was originally published on 14 September 2018 Pastry-bound parcels of deliciousness have been in the news a bit recently. Earlier in the week, the nation’s best pies were lauded at a (presumably) glittering awards ceremony, … Read more
From Auckland to Methven, two Aussie lads chased the essence of New Zealand rugby. Scotty Stevenson recounts their journey. Jay Staunton and Ricky Blanch have been mates since they were 13-year-old freshies at Brisbane Grammar School. They’re footy-mad boys from the heart of Brisbane, stalwarts of the Wests Bulldogs, where they make up two thirds … Read more
In the final part of our series exploring adventures around Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch, our writers take a trip through Auckland’s backyard, and further beyond. Scroll to the end of the story for a chance to win a weekend exploring in the new Hyundai Kona. I once fake proposed to my then girlfriend. It was … Read more
In the third part of a four piece series exploring places around Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch, Beck Eleven finds hidden treasures and clear water, and Simon Day falls in love with Banks Peninsula. Read part one, on the great Auckland summer road trip, here. Read part two, on the where to go on a good … Read more
In the second part of a four piece series exploring places around Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch, Spinoff Parents editor Emily Writes reveals the capital’s hidden secrets, while Avi Duckor-Jones takes you to the very end of the North Island. Read part one, on the great Auckland summer road trip, here. Windswept hideaways and long drives, … Read more
In the first part of a four piece series exploring the surrounding environments of Auckland, Wellington, and Christchurch by road trip, Spinoff writers Simon Day and Don Rowe head north, east and west from Auckland’s central city. Exploring New Zealand’s glorious natural beauty by car is a rite of passage for any Kiwi. The great … Read more
This morning Stuff.co.nz launched the pilot episode of Road Trip, an interactive webseries docu-drama looking to tell New Zealander’s stories from Cape Reinga to Bluff. Or, in this case, Bluff to Cape Reinga. In the first episode we meet Sarah, a frenzied Canadian backpacker and Beni, a chilled out Tongan-Kiwi who is forced to drive her to … Read more