New Zealand’s Great Outdoors

Duration:
15 Days, February 6 – 20, 2024

Tour Operator:
Criterion Travel

Isolated from other land masses by the swells of the Tasman Sea and the Pacific Ocean, New Zealand is a world unto itself. The island nation boasts unparalleled natural beauty—a land of glacial fjords, majestic peaks, geothermal marvels, endemic birds, pristine beaches and glacial lakes. Walking and hiking throughout New Zealand is one of the best ways to see these spectacular landscapes and explore its vast wilderness areas.

On this long overdue return to one of our favorite destinations, we’ll discover the highlights of New Zealand while sampling its very best trails and vistas. We’ll begin in Auckland with a scenic sail along Waitemata Harbor before our welcome orientation and dinner at the Grand Millennium Hotel. On the following morning, we’re off to Rotorua, the heartland of Maori culture and a geothermal wonderland, where we’ll spend two nights. We’ll then fly to Christchurch on the South Island and travel through the stunning Canterbury Plains for the turquoise waters and starry skies of Lake Tekapo. We’ll then venture into the Southern Alps for Mount Cook National Park, once a playground for such legendary figures as Sir Edmund Hillary, where we’ll find New Zealand’s highest mountains and Tasman Glacier, her longest glacier. Here we’ll also sample wine from the Gibbston Valley on our way to Queenstown for two days in New Zealand’s adventure capital, set against the spectacular Remarkables and majestic Lake Wakatipu. Thereafter, we’ll travel to picturesque Lake Te Anau, where we’ll spend three days exploring the vast glacier-carved wilderness of Fiordland National Park, including Milford Sound, before returning to Queenstown for one final night.

Here at last is an opportunity to enjoy New Zealand’s stunning beauty while sampling its very best trails, including the world-renowned Milford, Routeburn, Kepler, and Hooker Valley tracks.  If there was ever a heart-healthy adventure, this is it!

Traveling With You

Jan Hathorn is serving her 17th year as the Michael F. Walsh Director of Athletics at Washington and Lee University during the 2023-2024 academic year.  She is the first woman and just the seventh Director in school history.

During Hathorn’s time as Director of Athletics, W&L has enjoyed some of the best seasons in the history of the school, and has been awarded the Dan Wooldridge Champions Cup for Overall Excellence as the top overall athletic program in the Old Dominion Athletic Conference following all 16 of her years as director.

While athletic success has become the norm, academic achievement has always been at the forefront for W&L athletics under Hathorn’s leadership.  In 2022-2023, 413 students earned scholar-athlete status during the school year and a total of 16 students have been awarded the prestigious NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship during her tenure.  Scores more have been named the CoSIDA Academic All-America teams.

Hathorn arrived at W&L in the fall of 1987, serving as women’s soccer coach from 1987-2000 and women’s lacrosse coach from 1989-2007.  Between the two sports, she earned 11 ODAC Coach of the Year Awards and led the Generals to nine conference titles.  In 2010, she earned the Diane Geppi-Aikens Memorial Award for Lifetime Achievement in the sport of lacrosse.