My husband and I stayed at Bob & Maxine’s Hostel in March 2009, and I am thrilled to be the first one to review it, as I expect it will be the number one place to stay in Te Anau in all of the New Zealand guidebooks by the time the new editions are printed. We have been traveling in NZ for over 6 weeks, staying in hostels all the while, but we still often wind up comparing whatever hostel we are in at the moment to our stay in Te Anau at Bob & Maxine’s.

What really makes this place special is how friendly and helpful the enthusiastic/eccentric owners, Bob & Maxine (obviously!), are to all of the people who stay here. Bob made our tramp on the Kepler hassle free, by dropping us off in our rental car at the start of the walk, driving it back to the hostel for us for safekeeping, and then picking us up at Rainbow Reach in our rental car when we finished a couple of days later. Bob met us on the final part of the walk from Moturau Hut, and even generously carried... more