Day 98 - Rotorua to Lake Taupo

  Taupo, North Island, New Zealand
Sunday, December 9, 2007

We woke up in our little cabin fairly early, and promptly went back to bed. This pattern repeated itself a few times before the maid walked past and yelled at us, asking if we had paid for another night. We got the hint.

A short while later we'd packed and Katie had called a 'geothermal park & spa' by the name of Hell's Gate.
 
This park was named following a visit to the area by the legendary British author George Bernard Shaw, who suggested that the bubbling mud pools, boiling lakes and disgusting smell were surely as close as one could get to hell on earth. And he was an aetheist. Anyway...

Katie being Katie, it wasn't good enough to do the 3km walk around the park, we also had to have a 'spa' treatment, which looked like it mainly involved sitting in a pool of mud. Nice.

It was another horrible day, spitting with rain, the only upside is that apparently falling rain is good for the geothermal activity, so we tried to look on the bright side.

The lady at the front desk of Hell's Gate was very kind and produced a voucher which saved us 10%, and then off we set through the park, which is negotiated by following numbered attractions.

The first view over the steaming mud pools was quite impressive, it looked like another planet. 

 

We walked past the 'Ink Pots', which were black pits of 100 degree water, then past some very weird-named hot pools, and some pits of boiling mud...





...before doing a short 'bush walk' through the forest...



...where we saw the famous Kiwi silver fern which is immortalised on the 'All Black' rugby jerseys...



...a hot waterfall (?)...



... and various other vaguely interesting geothermal hotspots.

 

You were allowed to walk into one of the cooler pools to sample the medicinal qualities of the mud, which the Maoris swore by for hundreds of years before we showed up. Apparently who tribes would bathe in the bigger pools, rather them than me!

As we approached the end of the walk it started tipping down with rain, so we huddled under a tree to avoid getting soaked.

The rain did seem to send some of the hot pools a bit mental, which was cool.





The sulphuric steam expelled by these bubbling pits of hell was absolutely DISGUSTING, it smelled exactly like hundreds of rotting eggs.



As we approached the end of the walk, Katie got progressively more excited because she knew this meant we were getting closer to the spa treatment!

"We" (cough splutter) had decided to start with a 'private mud bath' (sounds appealing!), before finishing with a 'sulphur bath', which sounded even less appealing.

We stripped down to our swim gear, and walked into our private bamboo-fenced area, which had a small but cute little bath of what looked like hot chocolate bubbling away. Thankfully the contents were cooler than hot chocolate, but only just!

The mud was found right at the very bottom, usually piled up in the corners, and had been removed that morning from one of the 'medicinal' hot pools that I mentioned earlier.

We were advised to apply a bit of mud around our face and then our Japanese hostess kindly offered to take a photo.

For those of a sensitive disposition, look away now!

 

Helpfully, our hostess neglected to tell us to avoid putting any mud on our foreheads, because it will slide back into the eyes, which can get dangerous apparently.

So we merrily applied our own mud packs and enjoyed the warm mud like a couple of cold hippopotomi.

Some of the more unkind amongst you might suggest that the comparison doesn't end there!





We were allowed 20 mins in the mud bath (after which it is "dangerous" apparently... riiiight...), and then asked to have a FREEZING cold shower, to remove all the mud before stepping into the sulphur pool.

Unfortunately Katie got some of the mud in her eyes which was painful, but managed to wash it all out.

After that we were invited into the 'sulphur bath', which was warmer than your average bath, and considerably more, erm... aromatic!



It was really relaxing, and they say that sulphur is good for your muscles (at least according to that renowned authority Dr Katie Fey!), so we chilled out for while, as light rain sprayed us in a not unpleasant manner...



We tried both pools (one warmer and smaller, the other cooler but you could swim in it), and about 30 mins later were ready to leave.

We had one last (warm) shower, changed and hit the road, feeling refreshed but slightly alarmed by the Japanese girl's assurances that sulphur would be leaking from our pores for the next 24 hours! How attractive.

By now the weather had got even worse, so we headed for the largest geyser in the area, which (miraculously) goes off on the hour every hour; what a miracle of salt... I mean "nature"!

We were perfectly timed for the 2pm eruption, but decided against it because a) it was raining heavily and I didn't want to get the cameras wet, and b) it was NZ$ 50 EACH to get in! What a rip-off, that's a night's accomodation for 2 people over here.

So we went to get some lunch instead, and by the time we'd finished it was time for the 3pm show. Again it was still pelting down, so we decided to skip it, and head off to Lake Taupo, 2 hours further south.

We stopped at a really cool waterfall on the way down, called the 'Hukka Falls', which had bright blue water, it was unlike any waterfall I'd seen before. Not particularly dramatic, but very colourful.



After that we entered the pretty town of Taupo, with Lake Taupo on our left, which we could hardly see through the murky clouds and drizzle.



We stopped off at the tourist centre, Katie to enquire about tonight's accomodation, and me to enquire about where I could watch the Ricky Hatton fight which started in 40 minutes!

I visited a few of their suggestions, learnt that no-one was showing it live (it costs NZ$ 450 to show it live in the pub according to one friendly publican), but the Irish pub was showing a replay at 6pm.

So we shot off to find a bed for the night, just missing out on our first choice of a cabin up in the hills, and eventually settling for a double room in a new youth hostel 5 mins walk from the Irish bar! Result. 

We unpacked and then set off to watch the replay of the fight, which was an hour late arriving because what I hadn't appreciated was that the barman was (illegally) taping the fight at home and then bringing the video in for us to watch in the bar!

Anyway, we worked our way through a few drinks while waiting for the Hitman's most important fight, with the bar packed full of English guys.

I think Katie was one of only a couple of girls watching, but she did have a Manc allegiance to follow! Plus Ricky supports the same football team as her Mum.

Most of you will know what happened, the gutsy Hatton tried his heart out, attacking the champion Mayweather in his own 'back yard' like few before him.

He took the fight to the best pound-for-pound boxer in the world, and had him wobbling in the first round, when we nearly took the roof off!

Eventually you realised that Mayweather (clearly the gayest name ever for a champion boxer?) was sucking up the punches, had no cuts, and would soon be able to launch a counter attack, which Hatton was unlikely to be able to overcome as he was punching his heart out.

Hatton must have thrown 20 times the number of punches, but Mayweather was deadly with his, picking off the Hit Man with brutal efficiency.

Mayweather also did a great job of hitting Ricky with every dirty trick in the book, head, elbows, shoulder, forearm, you name it. The ref should have penalised him, but Ricky was the only one punished, for a rabbit punch thrown out of pure frustration.

Eventually in the 10th round Mayweather hit him with a sweet left hook, which threw Ricky into the corner of the ring, and you knew this was it. Hatton got up looking like me at the end of the first night of my Estonian stag party! He was a mess, and sure enough 30 seconds later it was all over.

Hatton had done all he could, but Mayweather is the best fighter in the world, and proved it. He clearly had a lot of respect for Ricky after the fight, his pride must have been damaged at the way Hatton dominated the flow of the fight, even he couldn't quite tag the Champ with a big punch.



We grabbed a very nice pizza on the way home (from a charmingly named establishment as you can see above!), and took it back to our hostel.

When she shut her eyes Katie's eyes wouldn't stop watering due to the sulphur/mud that I mentioned earlier, but eventually with a combination of blinking, water and eye drops we managed to enable her to get to sleep.

We went to sleep hoping for better weather tomorrow, as we hope to get out and do some activities on the Lake itself, maybe some kayaking or something like that...


Lots of love,


Al & Katie xx