Hi, I have just finished a tour of the South Island of New Zealand and have collected a lot of information on accessibility throughout. My full blog is available http://travability.travel/New%20Zealand/So...sland_Blog.html

Good on you cobber. I live here and haven't even seen it yet. Looking forward to reading your blog. Just had a quick look and it looks great. Pity about the inaccessability of some of the places you went to. Believe it or not we do have a building code and the limit on ramps is maximum 1:12 gradient.

Thanks, on the whole I thought it was pretty good and most of the operators were keen to make things happen. The new accommodation being built is really good. DOC have done a good job on the West Coast but still have a bit to do on the Otago and down south. The let down seems to be a couple of local councils who haven't even bothered to get a can of yellow paint and create some disabled parking spots. I have forwarded my comments to Tourism New Zealand so it will be interesting to see what sort of response I can get. Please feel free to tell me about anything I haven't covered.

The only other thing I find hard is rental cars. There are only two car rental companies that do cars with hand controls that I know of. One is Budget (who let me down severely by renting out the car I had booked last time which was their only hand controlled vehicle) and a smaller outfit in Auckland which mainly does older cars. I love cars and like to try different ones which is why I travel overseas mainly. Rentals are so easy to get in the US and Australia.

You might be interested in these . . .
http://www.apparelyzed.com/support/holiday...newzealand.html
http://www.apparelyzed.com/support/holiday...lfordsound.html