Coastal Australia & New Zealand

Melbourne opens the voyage with laneway cafes that treat espresso as an art form and street murals that change often. UNESCO named it a City of Literature, and the Queen Victoria Market and the central trams fit into the hours before sailing. Passengers board Azamara Pursuit for the 16-night run to Auckland.

The day at sea runs north-east along the Victorian and southern New South Wales coastline toward Eden. Nothing sits on the schedule beyond the ship itself, so the pool deck and the dining venues set the pace.

Eden sits on Twofold Bay, where Boyd’s Tower rises in sandstone above the water. Benjamin Boyd built the tower in the 1840s as a whale lookout, and the Eden Killer Whale Museum tells the rest of the story with the skeleton of Old Tom, the orca that herded whales toward local whalers. The Eden Lookout above town gives the widest view across the bay and the hinterland beyond.

Sydney Harbour makes its case within minutes of arrival, with the Opera House’s sail roofs, a UNESCO World Heritage site, framed against the Harbour Bridge. The Rocks, where European settlement began in 1788, sits a short walk from the quay and holds sandstone pubs and the Museum of Contemporary Art. The ship stays overnight, so the evening opens up for dinner ashore and a harbour ferry at dusk.

A second day suits the ferry run to Manly, where Pacific surf breaks beyond a pedestrian-only Corso. The walk through the Royal Botanic Garden to Mrs Macquarie’s Chair offers the classic view of the Opera House and the bridge together. Azamara Pursuit leaves the harbour once the day closes.

The Tasman Sea crossing starts as Sydney’s headlands fall astern and the ship turns south-east toward Fiordland. Albatross follow the wake across open water, so the rail rewards anyone who watches the horizon.

The second sea day closes the Tasman gap. The air cools and the swell lengthens as the ship nears New Zealand’s South Island, with Fiordland National Park next on the schedule.

Milford Sound opens the New Zealand section with Mitre Peak, which rises 1,692 metres straight from the water in Fiordland National Park. Lady Bowen Falls drops 162 metres beside the inner shore, and after rain extra waterfalls streak every cliff. Fur seals bask on the rocks near the entrance as the ship turns back toward the Tasman Sea.

Dunedin’s Scottish founders laid out the city in 1848 around the Octagon, where a bronze Robert Burns sits facing St Paul’s Cathedral. Dunedin Railway Station, a Flemish Renaissance landmark of black basalt and white Oamaru stone, stands a few minutes’ walk away. Out on the Otago Peninsula, Taiaroa Head hosts the only mainland breeding colony of northern royal albatross.

Christchurch earned the Garden City name from Hagley Park and the willows along the Avon River, where flat-bottomed punts drift beneath the bridges. The 2011 earthquakes reshaped the centre, and Shigeru Ban’s Transitional Cathedral, built partly from cardboard tubes, now stands as a symbol of the rebuild. The Botanic Gardens bend inside a loop of the river for a quieter half day.

Wellington packs a capital city and a working harbour into steep terrain, with coffee roasters on most corners. The Cable Car climbs from Lambton Quay to the Botanic Garden for the best view of both, and Te Papa, the national museum on the waterfront, covers Māori culture and natural history. Courtenay Place fills with bars and theatres after dark.

Picton sits at the head of Queen Charlotte Sound, where forested ridges drop into sheltered water. The Edwin Fox, launched in Calcutta in 1853 and now one of the world’s oldest surviving merchant ships, sits in a dry dock beside the harbour. The Snout track between Picton and Waikawa Bay follows a ridge with views over the sound, and the Marlborough wine region starts a short drive inland.

Napier rebuilt most of its centre within about two years of the 1931 Hawke’s Bay earthquake and chose Art Deco, so the streets now read like a 1930s film set. The Art Deco Trust runs guided walks from Tennyson Street, and Marine Parade runs along the waterfront past the Pania of the Reef statue. Hawke’s Bay’s wineries, known for syrah and chardonnay, start inland.

Gisborne greets each day before nearly any other city on Earth, and Kaiti Beach holds a memorial to the spot where Captain James Cook first stepped ashore in 1769. Māori navigators landed here centuries earlier, and the Tairāwhiti Museum covers that history alongside the region’s later settlement. Gisborne’s vineyards focus on chardonnay.

Mount Maunganui rises 232 metres at the end of a long surf beach, and the summit walk rewards climbers with views along the Bay of Plenty coast. Māori settled the bay around the 13th century, and kiwifruit orchards now cover much of the plain behind the harbour. The Mount Hot Pools at the base of the hill soothe tired legs afterwards.

The Bay of Islands scatters 144 islands across warm, sheltered water on the North Island’s northern coast. The Waitangi Treaty Grounds, where Māori chiefs and Crown representatives signed the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840, hold a 35-metre ceremonial war canoe and stage cultural performances. Across the water, Russell keeps some of the country’s oldest European buildings, including Pompallier Mission.

Auckland sits on a field of about 50 volcanic cones, and Rangitoto, the youngest, rose from the harbour around 600 years ago. The Sky Tower stands 328 metres tall, the highest freestanding structure in the Southern Hemisphere, with a revolving restaurant and a glass floor in the observation deck. The voyage ends here.