Mia Bennett
Founder of Ilohetki. Sets the planning philosophy and personally oversees bespoke itineraries and tricky routings.
Home / About
Our storyA small agency that still draws maps by hand
Ilohetki began with a simple frustration: too many New Zealand itineraries were assembled from templates. We believed the country deserved better editing — and so did its travellers.
How we began
Founded on a ferries-and-footnotes trip
Ilohetki was founded in Auckland by Mia Bennett, who spent years planning journeys for friends before admitting it was a profession. A postponed honeymoon, a borrowed campervan and three weeks of handwritten notes became the agency's first methodology: travel the route yourself before you ever recommend it.
We focus on New Zealand because it is the landscape we know in our bones — the ferry timetables, the seasonal closures, the café worth a detour. When our travellers do venture into the wider South Pacific, the same rule applies: nothing goes into an itinerary we haven't verified.
Today the agency handles trip design, destination planning, accommodation selection and personal support while you travel — a deliberately small portfolio of services, done properly.
Founder
Mia Bennett — Owner
Mia leads the agency's direction and still plans a share of every season's itineraries personally. Her conviction is unfashionable and simple: the best travel planning is done slowly, by someone who has been there.
"A good itinerary should feel inevitable — as if the trip could never have been arranged any other way."
The team
Four desks, one country memorised
Thomas Rangi
Based in Queenstown half the year. Knows every pass, lake road and lodge between Christchurch and Fiordland.
Elise Kaur
The voice travellers hear mid-journey — rebookings, restaurant changes, weather pivots and the occasional miracle.
Daniel Whitford
Turns conversations into routes. Writes the day-by-day documents our travellers carry, with every distance checked twice.
What we hold to
Values that shape every itinerary
01
Thoughtful planning
We'd rather plan ten journeys well than a hundred quickly. Every route is drawn, questioned and redrawn before it reaches you.
02
Local perspective
Recommendations come from our own kilometres — places we've stayed, meals we've eaten, roads we've driven in bad weather.
03
Clear communication
Honest prices, honest distances, honest opinions. If something isn't worth your time, we'll say so plainly.
04
Flexible travel
Plans should bend with weather, energy and mood. We build itineraries with room to move, and we stay reachable while you do.
05
Considered hospitality
Where you sleep shapes how you remember a place. We choose stays for character and care, not for commission.
06
A light footprint
We favour regional operators, sensible routing and stays that treat their landscapes as hosts, not backdrops.
Why travellers choose us
Small enough to care, experienced enough to know
Most of our travellers arrive through word of mouth and return for their next journey. They tell us the difference is attention: someone who remembers that you dislike early starts, prefer baths to showers, and always want the table by the window.
See the trips we plan
Quiet milestones
- 860+ journeys planned since 2016
- 34 destinations covered across New Zealand and the South Pacific
- 78% of travellers return or arrive by referral
- Featured in the fictional Aotearoa Travel Journal's "Planners to Watch" list
- Every team member travels at least four weeks a year — for research, not leisure
Meet us properly
A conversation costs nothing and usually clarifies everything. Tell us what you're dreaming about.