Tag Archives: Rotorua

Rain, more rain and pouring rain … all day.  We decide to take the opportunity to do some shopping – shorts for Andy, replacement sandals and underwear for me.  But despite our rain capes we still get wet.  What a dreary day!  We have discovered that Billy Connolly is on tour in New Zealand and is playing in Rotorua tomorrow.  So we make our way to Energy Events Centre to find out whether there are any tickets to be had.  A long shot, but still worth a try.  Apparently the show has been booked out for weeks, but by an unbelievable stroke of luck there may be some promotional tickets released for sale today; we need to try the box office which is in another building.  According to the Box Office the show is booked out, but mention of the possible release of some promo tickets and it turns out that there are eight tickets available.  We get two seats three rows from the front in the centre!  How lucky are we! And only NZ$199 (£66).  A bargain.   

While it continues to rain cats and dogs we spend the afternoon catching up on the blog.  We have had to re-house hattie on blog.com as the server problem is proving intractable and we don’t know when, or if, hattieontour.eu will be up and running again.  Fortunately most of our pictures and all the posts are backed up – so it could have been a lot worse. 

The camp site is sodden and our little tent is standing on a small patch of  slightly higher dry ground just on the edge of a very large puddle.  The paths are turning into temporary streams and the rain clouds are so low over the lake that visibility is down to a few yards. On the bright side it is warm and we have set up our laptops on a picnic bench under the canopy outside the kitchen.  From this vantage point we can watch the rain clouds lifting from the surface of the lake, only to return again a little later.  Oh the fickleness of the New Zealand weather!

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We wake to the most glorious view from our little tent – the sun rising over the lake just feet from our pitch, the waters lapping gently and the ducks waddling just outside the tent.  Can it get better than this?  A rowing team is out for an early morning training session and someone is paddling a kayak. 

We have to be up and out early for our trip to Wai-o-Tapu Thermal Park.  This park covers some 18 sq km and is the largest area of surface thermal activity in the Taupo volcanic region.  The area is covered with collapsed craters up to 50 metres in diameter and up to 20 metres deep.  Most have been formed over the last few hundred years by the action of acidic vapours rising from the below ground and dissolving the ground above.  There are  boiling pools of mud, water and steaming fumeroles.  We arrive early for the eruption of the Lady Knox geyser which is primed to blow at 10.15am every day.  The geyser is a short drive from the Visitors Centre and we overhear an American complaining – in all seriousness – that they should have built the geyser nearer the Visitors Centre! The geyser is induced to blow by using chemical blocks to break the tension of the surface cold water allowing the hot water beneath to shoot up several metres into the air.  An impressive sight. The geyser was discovered by convicts whilst washing their clothes in the hot surface pool;  soap breaking the surface tension and causing it to blow!  There are 25 points of specific interest in the park and we spend about an hour-and-half fascinated by the effects of the thermal activity.  Beneath the ground is a system of streams which are heated by magma left over from earlier eruptions.  The water is so hot (temperatures of up to 300 degrees C have been recorded) that it absorbs minerals out of the rocks through which it passes and transports them to the surface as steam where they are absorbed into the ground.  As a result there is a wide range of coloured deposits in the area adding to the dramatic effect –  green, orange, purple, white, yellow, red-brown and black  The most spectacular are the vivid lime green Devil’s bath,  the pale green of Lake Ngakoro, and the multi-coloured Artist’s palette.  There is a board walk across a huge sinter terrace which cover an area of 3 acres and has been created over the last 700 years as silica has been deposited from the water that trickles over it. www.waiotapu.co.nz

After lunch we visit the Te Puia Maori cultural centre.  This is set in another geo-thermal park.  Although not as varied as Wai-o-Taipu,  the large and vigourously boiling mud pool, Nga Mokai a Koko, and the 30-metre Pohutu geyser which spontaneously erupts 20 times a day soaking bystanders with a fine, cold water spray, are dramatic.  There are several traditional Maori buildings here, including Te Aroni a Rua Meeting House – decorated with intricate carvings, woven wall panels and patterned roof beams – as well as nationally re-knowned carving and weaving schools which teach traditional Maori skills.  The highlight though is the cultural performance of action song and dance  which starts with an elaborate Maori welcome haka led by a Maori warrior on the marae (the area in front of the meeting house).  After the formal welcome ceremony we enter the meeting house for a performance of wonderfully uplifting, evocative and graceful action songs and very dexterous poi and stick dances.  (Poi are balls on cord which are twirled whilst  rhythmically hitting the back and front of the hands) and a powerful haka full of energetic movements and fearsome facial expressions including bulging eyes and the sticking out of tongues.  The Polynesian roots of the Maori culture are very much in evidence in the traditional dress, the rhythms and the hand and body movements..

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We are continuing our drive south with the intention of reaching Wellington on Sunday.  Our next stop is Rotorua in the heart of New Zealand’s volcanic area and famed for it’s geo-thermal activity – hot springs, boiling mud pools and geysers.  There are also a number of Maori heritage ‘villages’ offering an insight into Maori arts, crafts and culture.  There is a whole host of other activities in the area to draw tourists – sky-diving, karting, helicopter rides, spas, wild life park.  Basically, you name it and it’s probably within 30 kms.  Rotorua town boasts 400 shops and seems to have a backpacker hostel around every corner.  There are also numerous hotels and motels to cater for the influx of coach parties and independent tourists.  The towns it is oh so neat and very clean; with  mainly single storey shops, weatherboard bungalows on their own plots and several historic buildings.    We arrive around lunch-time and decide, after a quick site check, to stop at Willow Haven Holiday Park.  This is a cheaper version of the Top Ten Holiday Parks, clean, a bit tired but with a superb location 6 km outside town right on the shore of Roturua Lake and we are able to pitch our tent on the water’s edge.  The lake is home to a large number of noisy gulls, some very friendly ducks and a contingent of black swans which we can see in the distance but never seem to come ashore.

The drive from Waihi Beach to Rotorua took us through more spectacularly beautiful countryside, greener now with steeper hills and deeper meandering valleys.  The road’s twists and turns delivering wonderful views over pasture, forest and the occasional vineyard and orchard.  The latter usually protected by hedges of towering conifers.  The roads are empty by UK standards and a joy to drive.  Occasionally our progress is interrupted by roadworks, which reduce the whole road to an unsealed off-road experience;  the traffic flow controlled, more often than not, by women wielding lollipop stop/go signs.  .

New Zealand skies are as beautiful as the weather is changeable.  Where could one see the clearest of rainbows at the same time as a glowing orange sunset?  Fluffy white candyfloss clouds float low in the bluest of skies whilst fine wispy strands of clouds high above scurry along at a different pace. 

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