NEW ZEALAND – CLOSER THAN EVER BEFORE

Peter Jackson’s Academy award-winning Lord of the Rings trilogy firmly put New Zealand on the world map with its vivid and exotic portrayal of Middle Earth, but while it provided a fantastic showcase for the wild and wonderful New Zealand landscape, it didn’t exactly provide much in the way of practical travel tips for the more earthly traveler.

Cadabra is a brand new website aimed at the independent traveler to New Zealand – that is, those people who want to design their own holiday – and it is packed full of innovative ideas and features to make that a whole lot easier. 

The magic of Cadabra is that it gives the traveler a complete resource – enabling them to research their holiday options, plan their stops and activities, and then book everything – all online.  But more than that – the website delivers something of the experience of the trip ahead – it is laden with the sights and sounds of New Zealand, and is brimming with local advice and guidance to help the first-time visitor.

Cadabra is a new venture launched by successful New Zealand technology entrepreneur, Graeme Frost.   After two decades of experience in the software industry, the idea for Cadabra came to Frost after a chance encounter with an American couple on a 10-day tour of New Zealand’s luxury lodges.  The couple had researched and booked different sectors of their trip over the Internet from their New York home, but their dream vacation turned into a logistical nightmare. They had used a dozen different websites to research and book parts of their holiday, but their tour plan didn’t quite join up properly on the ground.

Says Frost: “People arrive in Auckland - New Zealand’s main international airport - and then want to tour around. When they are planning their New Zealand holiday they have heard of places, but they are not always aware of the distances between many of the top destinations, or the best way to travel around them.  New Zealand is a long haul destination and it’s often ‘the trip of a lifetime’ for many Americans, so it is vital to ensure you have a well planned itinerary before you leave home.”

Cadabra is a partnership with ANZCRO, the largest inbound tour operators to New Zealand.  The site offers online users direct access to more than 1000 accommodation options and 3000 tourism services.  In addition to enabling online booking, Cadabra provides advice from local travel experts, travelers’ tips and ratings, and also Qualmark ratings (the official New Zealand tourism ratings system).

The service offered by Cadabra is best described as a comprehensive online tour planning solution.  It enables travelers to interactively build complex tour itineraries for their travel around New Zealand.  These personalized travel plans can be multi destinational with as many days, stops, and activities as desired.  And it enables split itineraries – for instance, someone goes fly-fishing in New Zealand’s bountiful rivers, while someone else treats themselves to a day in a luxury heath spa, before meeting up again and heading out for dinner in one of New Zealand’s many world-class restaurants.

The website is invaluable particularly for the first time traveler to New Zealand, as it offers the Cadabra Itinerary Wizard.  Cadabra builds a selection of itineraries based on the traveler’s preferences such as length of stay, grade of hotel, places they know they want to visit, and the experiences and activities they are interested in.  Once a recommended itinerary has been built, Cadabra then allows the user to modify it in any way they wish to plan their own “perfect vacation.”

So what would be your perfect New Zealand vacation? Would it be the skiing in Queenstown, whale watching in Kaikoura or fishing in Taupo?  Or perhaps tackling one of New Zealand’s famous scenic walks, such as the Milford or Tasman tracks?  Or visiting the best places to bungy jump, play golf, go wine tasting or tackle white water rafting?

Whatever it is, check it out on www.cadabra.com – the experience is almost as good as being there.

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Notes to Editors:

About Cadabra

Cadabra is a specialist technology company, based in New Zealand.  Cadabra has designed and developed an innovative website engin
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