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top ten: (south island only)

• Kaikoura (where the whale watching is -�dumb tourists aren't too abundant here (yet))
• Christchurch (cool city, can get away from dumb tourists easily)
• Lake Tekapo and Lake Pukaki - beautiful colour lakes, near mountains, great scenery
• Mt Cook - highest mountain in new zealand blah blah blah, not much up there in the "village" but some great hikes and it's beautiful if you catch good weather
• Wanaka�- getting a bit touristy now, but not as bad as...
• Queenstown - where most of the "extreme" sports are, full of people trying to be "extreme" but very beautiful and nice restaurants and when i lived there (ahem, 14 years ago now) the nightlife was great, ummm, some of the best hikes in new zealand are in this area
• Milford Sound - most touristy of all - ugh - and the sandflies (little bastard mosquito things) - but it is truly truly spectacular even in rain because of all the waterfalls... an alternative is Doubtful Sound - also great and a bit less touristy, get there from a place called "Te Anau" which is 2 hours or so from Queenstown on the way to Milford Sound
• whole West Coast (especially southern bit, from Haast Pass up to Hokitika, but skipping Hokitika is fine because it's a shithole full of hoons and bogans) including the glaciers (Franz Josef and Fox glaciers, very cool, you can walk up onto them, or one of them, can't remember, but the West Coast generally is beautiful but it rains a lot there and they really do fuck sheep there. no but they do.)
• Nelson is a nice town, but i'd recommend if he's going that way to go to Abel Tasman National Park - where you can go kayaking around the coastline (beautiful orange-sand beaches) or there's a track with huts along it, about 3 or 4 days of hiking - if he's into that? and if he's there for a decent amount of time then Golden Bay is really worth it (if he likes outdoorsy things and it's artsy fartsy craftsy and also he'll be able to find weed easily if he wants and if he does he should give my parents some because they need to chill out).

so basically, after all that, it depends how long he's there for and how he's getting around and what he's into. another place i love that isn't too touristy is Arthur's Pass - Craigieburn, Broken River, around there, middle of the Southern Alps�- very rugged and kiwi and quiet and cool and ok yes i'm biased because i spent half my childhood up there checking the weather towers with my dad. anyway. umm. how many's that? that must be about ten...

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