Island rambles: the Waiheke Walking Festival

Grab your walking shoes for the twelfth annual Waiheke Walking Festival. From November 5 – 21 2021, the festival will showcase Waiheke’s scenic, gastronomic, vinous and photogenic delights, with walks catering to many different ages, tastes and abilities.

Themes of the Waiheke WalkingFestival include mindfulness, photography, opera and conservation; some walks are all about fitness, others are family focused. There are progressive lunch walks through vineyards and walks through private land that can only be experienced during the festival.

Highlights for 2021 include a Shinrin-Yoku forest bathing walk finishing with a Japanese tea ceremony, a foodie progressive walk to The Oyster Inn, Mudbrick and Ahipao, a black tie and boots walk with a dinner and opera at Goldie Estate and the Windsor Doors Best of Te Ara Hura Matiatia to Blackpool walk, which finishes with a barbecue at Patron Sir Graham and Lady Raewyn Henry’s house.

With limited numbers for each walk, people need to book in advance; those who become a Friend of the Festival (for $100) get priority.