Ambury Regional Park

Ambury is a working farm that happens to let you camp on it, fifteen kilometres from the Sky Tower. Sheep and cattle in the next paddock, the Manukau Harbour in front, and the volcanic cone of Māngere Mountain behind. For a first or last night of a New Zealand trip it is hard to beat for sheer convenience.

The harbour foreshore here is one of Auckland's better wading-bird sites. At low tide the mudflats fill with godwits, oystercatchers and stilts — the bar-tailed godwits arrive in spring having flown from Alaska without stopping, which is worth thinking about while you watch them.

It is basic camping: grass, toilets, cold water. But you are twenty minutes from the airport and half an hour from the city, which for the night before an early flight is the whole argument.