green acres; A spectacular new lodge in New Zealand offers everything from out-of-this-world landscapes and an award-winning golf course to wine-tasting and hot-air balloons.(Cape Kidnappers)

Byline: Richard Alleman

About a decade ago, New Zealand welcomed a handful of small, ultraluxurious resorts that quickly became known as Super Lodges. Of these, none was as super as Kauri Cliffs, which opened in 2001 on 5,000 pristine acres on the semitropical northeast coast of New Zealand's North Island. An hour's flight from Auckland, Kauri Cliffs combined sumptuously turned-out cottages with a glorious setting, a top-notch chef, and one of the world's best new golf courses, a seaside stunner 200 feet above the Pacific, designed by the late David Harman.

Kauri Cliffs was the creation of American financier Julian Robertson and his wife, Josie. Not content to rest on their laurels, they soon set to building an even more spectacular golf course on a 6,000-acre ranch they had acquired on the southeastern coast of North Island, in the famed Hawke's Bay wine region. For this project, Cape Kidnappers, the Robertsons engaged architect Tom Doak to turn an extraordinary site-800 feet above the sea and characterized by steep, narrow ridges-into a course Golf Magazine has ranked twenty-seventh globally.

This month, Cape Kidnappers becomes a full-service resort with the opening of the Farm, a handsome new Super Lodge with 24 suites, plus a four-bedroom private cottage. The Farm at Cape Kidnappers has glamorous vintage-ranch interiors by star Aspen ...