South Island
Waitaki Valley
Limestone valleys, salmon rivers, and wine nobody expects.
South Island · Culture & history · Wine lovers · Nature lovers
The Waitaki Valley runs from the Southern Alps to the sea in a series of hydro lakes, Ōhau, Benmore, Aviemore and Waitaki, and limestone terraces unlike anything else in New Zealand. The town of Ōamaru at the valley's mouth is a Victorian port city of extraordinary ambition, its public buildings raised in the local cream-white limestone and preserved in a state of improbable elegance. The steampunk movement found its natural home here.
Inland, the Waitaki wine region is the newest and perhaps most intriguing in New Zealand: high elevation, limestone soils, and a continental climate that is producing pinot noir and riesling that critics are taking very seriously. The limestone country holds the Māerewhenua rock art, painted in red ochre on the outcrops, some of the most accessible ancient rock art in the southern hemisphere. The Waitaki River itself is among New Zealand's greatest salmon and trout rivers, private guided fishing here is an experience reserved for those who know to ask.
Among its moments
- Ōamaru Victorian precinct and steampunk quarter
- Little Blue Penguin colony, nightly return walk
- Waitaki wine region, pinot noir and riesling tastings
- Māerewhenua Māori rock art
- Waitaki River, private salmon and trout fishing
- Elephant Rocks limestone formations
Waitaki in photographs
Near here
All thirty regions, on the mapMackenzie Country
Turquoise lakes, the dark-sky reserve, and high country to the horizon.
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