Spaceships vs Travellers Autobarn

Both companies run Auckland and Christchurch and nothing else, both fleets are automatic, bar the manual version of Spaceships’ VW Cosmo, both sell unlimited kilometres, and both accept drivers from 18. Neither can finish a trip in Queenstown, and a one-way between them puts the Cook Strait ferry on your own account: Spaceships states that you book and pay for the crossing yourself, and Travellers Autobarn’s island-trips clause does not mention it at all. On paper these are close to the same rental.

They separate on party size and on paperwork. Four Spaceships models sleep two, the Beta seating four but still sleeping two, and the VW Cosmo sleeps three. Travellers Autobarn runs five vehicles, from a Station Wagon with no bed and no kitchen up to the Hi5, which the company describes as sleeping four adults. Certification then cuts the other way. Spaceships lists three models, the Beta 2S, Sigma and Cosmo, as green-warrant certified, each with the fixed toilet that standard requires. Travellers Autobarn lists four, the Chubby, HiTop, Kuga and Hi5, as self-contained, but its own terms, effective 19 June 2026, say that for ‘certain campervans’ the certificate depends on a NZ$50 portable toilet issued at pick-up, and no warrant number, issue date or standard is published.

On the road the difference is what the contract forbids and what it leaves you owing. Travellers Autobarn names five exclusions outright: Ninety Mile Beach, Skippers Road, Crown Range Road, Ball Hut Road and the Coromandel north of Colville Township. Crown Range Road is the one that catches people, because it is sealed, it is a state highway and it is the direct Wanaka to Queenstown crossing; ski field access roads are barred from 1 June to 31 October, and a trip suspected of leaving the seal costs NZ$250 even where nothing is damaged. Spaceships names Skippers Canyon Road, Ball Hut Road and Ninety Mile Beach, and the Crown Range is not among them. Liability then runs opposite to the bonds: Travellers Autobarn holds NZ$3,500 on a credit card but its included Standard Protection leaves the hirer liable up to NZ$50,000 on a single-vehicle rollover or write-off, where Spaceships holds NZ$5,000 and caps write-off liability at NZ$18,000. The smaller bond is the larger exposure.