If You're NearbyNatureRock formationsCoast

Punakaiki

A West Coast village beside the Pancake Rocks, layered limestone stacks where the sea bursts through blowholes.

Photo: Krzysztof Golik · CC BY-SA 4.0
Best Time to Go
Nov–Mar
Our full guide to Punakaiki is being written. It's on the South Island list as If You're Nearby.

Go Next

1–3 of 18
Worth a Detour
Mountains · UNESCO

Aoraki/Mount Cook

Canterbury
About 129 miles away

New Zealand's highest peak, with dark skies and blue Lake Tekapo.

Guide Coming Soon
Worth a Detour
Mountains · Mountain towns

Lake Tekapo

Canterbury
About 129 miles away

A turquoise lake with a stone church, in a dark-sky reserve.

Guide Coming Soon
Worth a Detour
Nature · UNESCO

Franz Josef Glacier

West Coast
About 111 miles away

A glacier that runs down toward temperate rainforest, with Fox Glacier and the mirror views of Lake Matheson nearby.

1 Sight

The Full Short List

South Island

Milford Sound, Queenstown and the Southern Alps.

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