Planning my trip for October and was wondering what peoples opinions were of the Southern Scenic Route. Basically from Te Anau to Dunedin. We're not big into tramping, short ones are ok but love driving and seeing the scenery and don't have time for Stewarts Island.

We did it in Jan '09 and loved the drive. Look at our trip report.

We started from Queenstown so the first part is a bit different. You will probably go down to the the coast hugging the National Park boundary. That should be a nice drive too. The cosat is beautiful we really enjoyed the day and liked Dunedin too. Spend a day or two there if you can.

Our report gives some detail on the drive and pictures we took along the way. We are not into hiking but love beautiful scenery and don't mind driving. The roads are good and there isn't much traffic. It is very rural area.

www.aroundtheworldin132days.blogspot.com

Click on Jan on the right and scroll to Jan 19 for the report on the drive and some pictures along the way.

What an amazing journey you went on, thanks for sharing. I think we're two peas in a pod as my wife and I enjoy just driving and looking at scenery as well. I looked at your entire NZ trip and it gave me encouragement that I wasn't being too ambitious in my journey as I think you covered more distance per day then what I have planned.

Thanks for reading our blog. We did have a grand journey. Many people told us we were driving to much in NZ, but we like driving trips here in the States (Drove 18,000 mites to Alaska and back this past Aug-Oct). The South Island has so much to see, we wanted to see it ALL!!

The roads are mostly two lane as I said, but are easy to drive and welll marked. Well, if you are doing the West Coast you will have a several one lane bridges, one that is also shared by the train!! Because it was summer when we were there, it was light early and way late so we had plenty of time each day to drive longer distances and see the sights at the same time...we were in and out of the car lots plus we got to our nightly stops in time to explore a bit.

Glad my report helped. Have a great trip. New Zealand is a wonderful country to visit!

We put 1500 miles on our rental in Ireland, another great place to visit, and people thought we were crazy there too. I'm looking forward to this trip just as much. Just have a few little details to finalize. I'd hate to add up the hours I've spent reading sites and blogs and guides planning for this trip and I'm still 7 months away.

cwn, great blog. i especially enjoy the history and detail of the areas that you mention. Did you get your info from guide books or do research?

Carol,

I read lots of trip reports on these boards and information on internet travel sites for various locations. That narrowed down the places we wanted to see, then I when to guide books, both the ones on the internet and in book stores.

Then, of course, the locations we visited and our guides gave us more information.

There were so many places that sounded good, it was hard to narrow things down to a "reasonable amount of time". We could do the trip again to a whole new set of places. "If only money grew on trees!" Oh Well!

Thanks for reading!

A few years ago we did the SSR from TA to Dunedin, stopping one night in Invercargill to get an early start into the Catlins. We stayed there a night, which let us see the penguins go to sea from the bush, at dawn. Well worth the time.

I drove 1200 miles in NZ, and was glad to return the car without a scratch.