Best Western Midway Hotel Rotorua

... sack.

Last night due to the freezing temperatures we stayed in and watched a xmas movie. It was sweet and unlike when it was actualy xmas and 30C it felt appropriate. After all it was teh cruelist curse of the witch in Narnia to mek it 'always winter and never xmas'. Here it will hopefully not always be winter but it will nver be xmas in winter - we are living in CURSE!

... irish men are not to ever be seen topless - certainly not alongside 20 something beautiful people who can't afford to eat. Let alone in front of 20 women. FOOK!!! We are put through the routine by the Maori sons - one of whom is about 6 with a mullet and is splitting his sides laughing at our efforts. I am quite good at remembering stuff being in my thirties and get the moves down to a tee. Not so good at pulling the Maori tongue out, eyes wide ...

We got the car - a lovely 7 year old white Nissan Sunny. All hire cars appear to be medium-sized, white and Japanese. We drove on down to Rotorua - not a bad drive in the light NZ traffic. It still smells of sulpher here so we went to see some bubbling pools of mud. We are staying just outside Rotorua in a Holiday Park. We have a place for $70 a ...

... in a hot tub in the sun. We got to the beach parking lot which was really isolated, and there was fresh broken glass in the lot from a recent car break in. While we're packing/unpacking stuff, a beater car popped into the parking lot, made a loop and sped out. It seemed probable this guy was scouting the lot for fresh rental car meat. NZ has signs at every parking lot warning of break ins but this was the first lot with ...

... of Wai-o-tapu and Waimangu. Our first encounter with geothermal activity was Lady Knoxx geyser at Wai-o-tapu. This geyser erupts everyday at 10:15am, with some help from the park staff (some soap powder is thrown in the geyser to stimulate the eruption). It was spectacular to see the jet of cold water reaching 10m high in the sky. As if we hadn't had enough of the smell, we carried on into the main geothermal park! Wai-o-tapu is a spectacular park ...

... of jerked upwards for a bit and then it all was quiet and smooth and lovely - and safe to open my eyes! And the scenery underneath was amazing. Rotorua has quite a few different lakes, which is one reason why it's a better spot to sky dive than Taupo, a few kilometres down the road. Eric told me to lift my knees a bit, and this meant I was sort of sitting in the harness, and then he did a bit of a guided tour as we slowly floated to the ground, so he ...

... a great job, although I was a bit concerned he would embarrass me as an American. He was respectful and handled the responsibility with grace and dignity; indeed, the only thing I can hold against him is that when asked what South Carolina was known for, he said golf instead of Stephen Colbert. It was another great experience. However, the best part of our trip was still to come. I won't lie. One of the main reasons I wanted to come to New ...

... hole. Lady Knox works hard for the tourists and can go on spitting water for an hour. The scenery looks like in the moon (never been there but guess it might look like that), with all colours in the world around you, orange rocks, bright green lakes, pink steam... The biggest lake is called the Champagne Pool - didn't really look very inviting though to go there for a swim, it's all quite poisonous looking! The following ...

... can't even tell how far above you they are, which is kinda gross - they could only just be over your head.... bleurgh. Then we were done and stuck waiting for the Black Water Rafters to finish. Luckily the weather was waay better today it was actually quite hot so a few of us sat outside and had some lunch while we waited, and this is where I met Darren, a totally freak of nature, who reckoned he used to cook at some Embassy in Australia ...

... which has you climbing Karate-Kid like onto the top of a telephone pole and then jumping through 3m of air to catch a Trapeze. Crazy! Thanks for the Tip, Hannah. Another beautiful sight near Taupo are the Huka Falls. The nearby Aratiata Rapids are to be missed as they are ridiculously silly ...