MoaTours is a New Zealand family business founded by Ena and her son Miles joining the business in 2008. Ever since we were kids, we’ve all known that there are so many absolutely magical spots all over the country, so in 1971 Ena and a few others decided to start up a tour company. In those days MoaTrek focused on backpacker trips, the first ever trip were young Aussies and Japanese travellers.
We kept running backpacker trips and pretty soon we knew everyone all around the country, and our trips were super popular. Fast forward to today and our trips have grown up a bit, just like us possibly, and we now travel to the same amazing spots but we happily rest in comfort at the end of each day in our 4-star hotels instead of pitching a tent.
Miles and Ena are out and about researching new itineraries and making changes to existing ones to ensure our MoaTours travellers’ experience is unsurpassed in New Zealand small group touring. They love the magic that happens on every trip when a group of travellers share a once in a lifetime experience – it’s what they live for and keeps them coming back for more.
See MoaTours in action in the 1970s:
We’ve been showing off the best parts of New Zealand since the 1970s, take a look at one of our earliest videos.
What’s a Moa?
Unique to New Zealand, Moa lived for 60 million years in a lush, peaceful and primeval landscape until the end of the 13th century. Like the Kiwi, Moa couldn’t fly – instead, they walked everywhere. Unfortunately, they were no match for the Maori, the new migrants to New Zealand, who saw them as a tasty, easy-to-catch resource and didn’t hesitate to put them on the menu and make cloaks from their feathers. Now extinct, these birds once came in several sizes – from small (1.3m tall) to very big (2m tall and weighing 250kgs).
