Rotorua

Rotorua is an area with widespread thermal activity. The drive from Taupo was unique in itself where occasionally roads and nearby forests appeared to be letting off clouds of steam!
Once in the city centre, it didn’t stop. Steam rose through drain covers, and pretty much any nook and cranny. The general aroma of sulphur also engulfed us.

Our camp site channelled this activity and created a “hangi” – a traditional method of cooking embraced by the Maori. Not to miss an opportunity, we cooked up some fish!

Olly also dug himself a bath on the nearby hot water beach. The thought is that hot water trickles in creating your own spa unfortunately it looked and smelt like swamp water so he didn’t indulge!

Instead, we went to the Hell’s Gate thermal treatment spa and got ourselves covered in hot mud and then soaked in the naturally hot spa (about 42°C). Our skin felt silky smooth after, although you do have to wash with a special ammonia soap to avoid any smells clinging to the skin.

Keeping up our adrenaline levels from the week before, we also enjoyed mountain biking in a red wood pine forest and raced luges down from the town’s peak.

Before heading on, we visited the Wai o Tapu “thermal wonderland”. This offered truely unique sites; different coloured bubbling thermal pools, all coloured with minerals which come to the surface. Eerie, but stunning. We also saw a geyser in action.

Bright green pool laced with sulphur

The Lady Knox geyser

The Artist’s Palette

View from the highest bike track

Mud, mud, glorious mud!

Luge racing!

Steamy fish