Enjoyed the Kiwi Experience a lot but there are a few things which mean I would think twice about doing it again.

1) Nelson and Queenstown are the bottle necks and it is very easy to get stuck there, kiwi don't care if you have a flight to catch or how long in advance you requested it. Some way to allocate you a seat on a $1000 bus pass! In the end despite trying to reserve a bus out of Queenstown a week in advance they put us on Standby and we had to pay extra to go with a different firm. Not good enough Kiwi.

2) I was absolutely shocked at the drivers behaviour He allowed people both to sit on the floor because the bus was full and also the courier seat was used nearly everyday, both of these are illegal and the driver even commented "no sitting on the floor tomorrow guys, you'll have to get a different bus, there is a good chance I'll get pulled going into Queenstown"

3) Don't pay the price on the website. You will probably get at least 30 percent off in NZ, both islands for $420 which is less than just a one island pass for example. Majorly pissed when I realised I was the only one who paid full price.

4) The activities they take you to and do are very very very expensive

Other than that, i think they take you to more places and show you more stuff and give a lot more commentary than people make out. Yes at night it is a party bus but this wasn't forced and many people opted out of the drinking and pub crawls and had a good time. Had a really good time and I'm giving them a 7, just wanted to highlight some of the problems you can have with them and I was genuinely suprised how such a big operator didn't seem to know what was going on re bus spaces and allocating you a day to travel and the whole having people on the floor/courier seats is absolutely ridiculous considering they charge top dollar.

Reviewed over 14 years ago