Warning…this is a very long post, I kinda lost the run of myself!
Hi kids, it’s post time again.
Last time we wrote we had just arrived in Rotorua and started adjusting to the smell. I can’t really say that we have completely come to terms with the it but its getting better or should I say we’re noticing it less.
Yesterday we headed into town in the morning to the local information centre or i-site as they call them to see what was the best way to spend our time here. Having been suitably informed we headed off to Skyline Luge on the outskirts of the city. Here you take a gondola ride up to the top of a very big hill/mountain and from there take your pick of one of three tracks (scenic, intermediate or advanced) to hurtle down on a luge. Lots of fun!
Now the luge for those of you who haven’t seen one before is basically a tea tray with wheels and handle bars to steer your way round corners. This also doubles as the brake if you pull it towards you but that’s not the point because you’ll only go slower then!!
After lunch we headed back into town and had a look around Government Gardens. Lots of outdoor bowling greens, croquet lawns and rose gardens. Not forgetting a few steaming pools of water dotted about the place. It’s also the home of the Blue Baths, an old public bath house which is now partly a museum but still has one outdoor pool you can go for a swim in. Interesting fact – the baths were apparently the first place in the world that allowed men and women to use the same swimming pool back in the 30’s when it first opened.
We then took a wander round to the Polynesian Spa, here you can take a dip in some genuine volcanic mud or have hot stones put on – not why you would pay for that sort of torture!?! We decided seeing as we had such a hard day’s sightseeing we needed a dip in a hot pool. We got one with of view of Lake Rotorua, it was roasting! Sadly you’re only allowed to stay in it for half an hour….
So onto to today – we spent most of the day at Te Puia, a geothermal park and Maori cultural centre type place. Here we got to see lots steaming holes in the ground, a cooking pool (a large hole with boiling water bubbling away in it) and lots more. We took a guided tour where a local Maori woman showed us around and told us lots about the maori way of life, customs and beliefs. Highlights of the tour included – a huge lake of boiling mud, a traditional maori village, the Kiwi house where got to see an actual kiwi (not the fruit, the bird!) and last but not least the Pohutu Geyser and the smaller Prince of Wales Geyser beside it. We had to sit and wait a wee while for it to start doing its thing but it’s pretty impressive. Pohutu shoots water about 20 metres into the air for about 20 minutes! An added bonus was watching a whole gaggle of Japanese tourists run about trying to get their photos taken in front of the geyser, turns out there are a lot of combinations a family of Japanese people can have their photo taken in!!!
We also got to see a cultural performance in the ‘meeting house’ at the centre of the park. This involved lots of traditional dances and song including the men doing the Haka – a dance used to scare of enemies before a battle, now mostly used to scare of the opposition rugby team before the All Blacks play. One of us tourists was picked to be our chief for the day. He had to accept a leaf from one of the local warriors as a sign that we came in peace and then greet all the male warriors with a handshake while touching noses twice. Unfortunately I wasn’t picked so I missed out on the opportunity to get up close and personal with these particular Maoris.
In other news we got our flat tyre replaced at ‘The Tyre General’. We are now back to a full compliment of five tyres and the general even had time to shine up the sides of all the other wheels so you might think they were all new, if you don’t look at them for to long.
We head in the general direction of Lake Taupo tomorrow not sure yet what we’ll find there apart from a whole load of fresh water.
Jonny
Maori dancing
Rotorua and Gondola
