Tuscany Villas Motor Inn Rotorua

... sleep in the camper again – that roughing it thing. I’m holding out for the large, beautiful hotel in Tongariro Park.

We continue to find NZ very easy country for travelling – with the exception of the driving. Mike is doing all of the driving so far as the roads are all extremely narrow and winding. For anyone who has been to Maui, it’s like that twisty road to Hana – but the whole ...

... weils so schön war. Eigentlich verwunderlich, dass die 10 jährige Tilly schon lesen kann, bei der Unzahl an Unterrichtsstunden und Arbeit täglich.

Liebe Leute, die Gastfreundschaft und Akzeptanz dieser intakten neuseeländischen Familie war nur sensationell. Ich konnte gar nicht genug kriegen. Erst 2 Tage vor meiner Abreise fingen sie mich an zu christianisieren. Katholisch zu sein, genügt ja schon nicht mehr, die beiden hatten natürlich eine noch bessere Richtung gefunden ...

... all over the place - you don't go head over heels which I was glad about. It was so much fun - I really loved it! When we came to a stop they took some photos of us and then I tried to get out but was slipping all over the place and ended up falling out backwards. Ror came down after us on the zig zag track which looked cool.

We drove to Te Puia then where we went into a Maori prayer house and saw them perform traditional dances and songs and ...

... the food was very good! After dinner they put on a concert with traditional Maori songs and dances and costumes and was also very interesting. That night was called Matariki.

The next day I went to a sheep farm about 45 minutes from Rotorua. This is the site of the last remaining movie set from the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Hobbiton is where the hobbits lived in their little hobbit holes. The original ...

... the price and he said $27, wow awesome, ill stay, i later found out that was the price for the party hostel where most of the rest of the bus were staying. Id landed a place of luxury for the same price.

I was given a fluffy towel, wow i have a fluffy towel for 2 night, yipee, that was so nice after using my flumsy travel towel for the past year, i could now use a nice warm cosey towel. The whole place had under floor heating, so i was ...

On the afternoon of the 15th, post sky-dive, we headed for Rotorua. We were greeted by the smell of rotten eggs, god those geezers reek. Whilst in Rotorua, Bex and Fran did some sightseeing, whilst i stopped at the campsite and saved the cents, very aware that i couldn't very well meet Simon the South America with not a penny to ...

... also cooked kumara (sweet potato) and noemal potatoes too. Whilst this was finishing cooking, they took our group on a tour of the forest nearby where they gave a display of their cultural songs and dances including their haka. After the show, we sat down for the buffet which was all you could eat. And we did. Afterwards they took us for another tour, this time in the dark throught the forest, where we saw glowworms. These were quite difficult to see ...

In the morning, we drove to our first destination in the Kawhia Bay, called Ocean Beach. We had to be there around the low tide because you can dig a pit in the sand and let the hot springs under the sand fill the "tub" with hot water. Pretty amazing huh? You can do this in two places on the North Island, and this one was the least out of the way for us, so we decided to check it out and we really wanted to relax on the ...

... night ended with a tour in the nearby sanctuary, where we all saw for the first time various animals of New Zealand. The kiwi was of course the protagonist of the show. The kea was also notable, especially because of its interest for rubber (we probably have to be extra careful in the south island if we don't want to have our campervan destroyed by these lovely birds). The following day was even smellier than the previous one. We visited the geothermal ...

I'm sitting here in Tourism Rotorua on Fenton Street, having had a really awesome day - I've done the ultimate - the ultimate for me that is: a tandem skydive at 9000 ft. But more of that later. The day started with the shuttle bus to Wai-O-Tapu otherwise known as 'Thermal Wonderland'. So we were taken to see mud pools, where there was this spectacular violent boiling mud which kept on erupting - the largest in New Zealand. And then it was off to Lady Knox ...