Planning for New Zealand

We leave for New Zealand in a week! I wanted to outline some of the planning we did to prepare for such a long trip. Before leaving we needed to plan visas, flights, travel insurance, bank accounts and phone numbers.

Visa: So first things first we needed visas! We got working holiday visas which allow us to work while in the country. Applying for the visa was super easy you basically just click apply! The New Zealand Government Website is super helpful and walks you through the process. As a Canadian it cost about $200 CAD and as an American it was free! The visas took 1 week to get approved and then you print it for customs when you arrive in New Zealand. On to the next step!

Flights: Looking into flights was super fun but also overwhelming. There are so many options and "bargain" flights that it is easy to get swept up in a "too good to be true" deal. We used Sky Scanner to narrow down flights. With a site like Sky Scanner I always buy directly from the airline. There were some unreal deals but they were through a separate agency. So if there were any issues with the flights we would have no protection, we figured risk wasn't worth the reward after reading reviews of the agency that was selling super cheap flights. We ended up buying a flight from Air New Zealand for $1300 CAD, and even contemplated getting at sky couch haha! Check it out!

Travel Insurance: Ugh, travel insurance is one of those mandatory things that you need and we did a lot of research and discussion on what would be the right choice. I was stuck choosing between an insurance with more coverage from World Nomads which comes super well recommended or from Orbit Insurance which is a New Zealand company that offers an insurance tailored for a New Zealand working holiday visa or IMG Insurance. The difference in price was huge World Nomads was about $900 CAD and Orbit Insurance was about $300 CAD for the year and IMG was $700 CAD including adventure sports add on. The coverage was slightly different (Orbit Insurance didn't cover black water rafting or rock climbing) but New Zealand has the ACC (Accident Compensation Corporation) which covers some costs if you get injured from an accident, they even cover foreigners! Then after much discussion we ended up choosing IMG, because it had good reviews and coverage and wasn't quite as expensive as World Nomads.

Bank Accounts: So hopefully we will make some cash while in New Zealand so we needed bank accounts! We chose to go with ANZ, and you can even open a bank account before you leave so your money can be waiting for you when you arrive. One thing to note about opening a bank account is you will need a permanent address in New Zealand. After emailing the bank they suggested using hotel or hostel, but my good friend is from New Zealand and so I ended up using her brother's address because since we will be living in a van we won't have a permanent address!

Phone Numbers: We will have to stay in touch haha! We looked at 4 big phone companies, Spark, Skinny, Vodaphone and 2 degrees. We are opting for an unlimited plan from 2degrees because basically it was the cheapest unlimited we could find. It'll be $55 per month for each of us. We discussed having one person with an unlimited plan and hotspotting the other but most plans had slower speeds after 40 GB, and you know we want that fast internet for Netflix!

Well that is pretty much it for necessary planning! We also did a lot of research and planning on vans which is a lot more fun than insurance and flights haha!

#workingholidayvisa #newzealand #travel

Jumping with excitement, New Zealand here we come!