You can imagine how everyone felt this morning after all we did all only get 3 hours sleep. Self inflicted I suppose! The bus drove in complete silence all the way to the Huka (foam) Falls, situated on the Waikato (foaming water) River. The falls are actually only 11 metres high, but as you can see from the videos, they are still very, very powerful. What appears to be a channel blasted out of the rocks was actually formed by an earthquake ripping pulling the Earth apart. You can see why this is one of the very few stretches of water in New Zealand that cant be rafted down!
Around lunchtime we pulled in the scenic town of Taupo, situated on the banks of the mighty Lake Taupo, Australasia's biggest lake. They estimate that Singapore could fit in the lake, with space left around it to be fish in! As well as being a very popular Trout fishing destination, the Lake also holds regular sailing regatta's on its waters.
We were staying here for a couple of days to give our driver Dallas a day off, so we went for a walk around the town to see what it had to offer us which disappointedly wasn't much. Although there were a couple of bars, we discovered that Taupo was a retirement town for rich Kiwi's, so we didn't expect much!
Surpringly though we had did have a really good night at the comically named Holy Cow 'nightclub'. This could have had something to do with the Smirnoff Ice drinks we were drinking containing 7% alcohol instead of the usual 5% they do at home! Either way as you can see from the photo?s we were all up on the tables dancing in no time!
Monday 22nd November
Although I really liked the town Taupo, I believe I might enjoy it a bit more when I?m in my 60's, and I could partake in all the bridge and bingo nights I saw advertised around! Today we were to drive another 200+ kms South into the middle of nowhere, better known as River Valley.
Before arriving though, Dallas decided we needed a little walk through the Tongarrio National Park. What he didn't say though was the little walk was 2 hours up and down mountains. While we started walking the trail, Dallas ran off and completed the circuit in 40 minutes. Mad Kiwi!
While walking through the National Park me and Katie decided to stupidly swim in another waterfall. I must start remembering that the water from these falls originates from snowy mountains up high, it was so bloody cold! As you would imagine, we only stayed in there long enough for everyone to get a photo! As well as it being cold, the water actually hurt your back when it hit you!
Just before we got onto the bus we stopped to look at 3 volcanoes, worryingly all active. There was Mt Tangariru, Mt Nguruhoe and lastly Mt Raupariu, or as you might know it, Mt Doom from the Lord of the Rings movies! Mt 'Doom' actually erupted in 1995, so with that thought we jumped back onto the bus!
We ended the day at River Valley, a lodge situated, like i said, in the middle of nowhere, on the banks of the Rangitikei River. It was too late to do any activities now, so after a few games of the highly addictive game shxxhead, we headed for bed. Well we needed all our energy for tomorrow... we were going White Water Rafting!
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