|
  | |  |
Reeking Rotorua
Entry 23 of 75 | show all | print this entry |
|
The first thing you notice driving into Rotorua is the smell, glances were going back and forth across the van, but neither us was guilty, we realized we had reached the "Sulphur City".
We rolled into Rotorua Thermal Springs campsite which was very pleasant with thermal springs and a pool, bar the smell of course, and signed in for a couple of nights. Dinner that evening was sausages on one of those small disposable bbq's - it wasn't bad apart from the grit on each sausage as each one had managed to roll of the grill at one point or another.
The next morning we were up for some more adrenaline activity and headed down to Agroventures just outside of town. We bought a triple bypass that paid for a go on the Agrojet, jet boating around a small course, which was a good introduction to the jet boating we were going to do in Taupo, good fun with some big G's pulled and an impressive driver as you thought he was going to clip the banks at some points.
Swoop, a sort of pendulum swing where you are strapped together facing the ground in a sleeping bag type harness, hauled 40m up on a crane and then you have to pull your own ripcord to let yourself swing towards the ground. This was awesome and fairly scary, Maud was especially scared with the height and freefall sensation you got just after you had pulled the ripcord. Needless to say the photos of this were classic grimaced faces just before the drop and then laughing, thumbs up after the first swing. Unfortunately the disc they were supposed to be burnt onto was blank when we tried it at the next internet café, but after phoning them I think the parent-in-laws will be receiving a new disc in the post sometime, I just hope the pics are of us as I had to explain what we looked like over the phone.
The final activity to do was zorbing which was just a short drive up the road. This was something both Helen and I had been looking forward to as it was invented in NZ and involved strapping yourself into a giant plastic ball,
which is surrounded by an even bigger plastic ball with struts in between the two to give the cushioning (pictures explain better). When we got there we decided to do a dry zorb where you are strapped in, rather than a wet zorb where you are not strapped in but they put water in with you. The reason being (according to Joynson) that with water all that happens is you flow round with the water so just stay at the base of the zorb rather than actually spinning with the zorb (we understood what he was saying when we saw people doing it, not sure if you will). When we saw the hill though we weren't that impressed as it was fairly small and for dry zorbing you just went straight down rather than on the zig zag course for wet zorbing.
Anyway to cut along story short we were fairly disappointed with the whole zorb thing, the hill was to small and it wasn't really extreme at all !!
Not to be outdone we then headed up to skyline skyrides, which is a gondola up to a hill behind Rotorua, with 3 luge tracks at the top.
This was really good fun and involved sitting on a sort of low down go cart with handlebars in the middle that if you pulled towards you slowed you down, and hurtling down a number of tracks as fast as possible. Donning lovely helmets, we set off down the scenic track first which was a big 2 km run with some places you could stop to get pictures. After getting a chairlift back up the competition was brewing between us so we headed down on the intermediate and advanced tracks the next 4 times. Obviously having the weight advantage meant I was easily beating Maud, so I had to start giving her head starts and she eventually won the last leg.
I think this meant I had to pay for the ice creams we devoured at the top before we headed back down on the cable car !
That night I also had to cook, I think this had to do with bragging rights as well, but managed to serve up pretty decent fajitas on a one burner stove. We then headed out to a few bars in town, one being the Pig & Whistle, an old converted police station, where I supped down some "Swine Lager" and Maud had a few ciders.
The next day dawned wet and grey so we decided that we should do something indoors and as we were in Kiwi-land we thought we should actually try and see a kiwi. In the wild this was very unikely so we went to the Kiwi Encounter at Rainbows Springs Nature Park just outside Rotorua. We weren't really sure what to expect with this but we spent the first hour or so going around the springs and through the native bush and creating a feeding frenzy in the trout pool with the fish food we picked up on the way in. We did see one kiwi in the nocturnal house but the glass was pretty filthy and he was hiding at the back.
The Kiwi Encounter was a tour through the kiwi conservation building at Rainbow Springs. Basically the project has kiwis in the wild that are monitored and when they lay an egg the project try and retrieve it, incubate it at the facility and when it hatches they feed them until they're big enough and strong enough to fend for themselves as most baby kiwis are killed by possums, stoats and dogs so only have about a 5% survival rate.
Just as we started the tour a conservation worker arrived with a new egg so we saw them weigh & measure it, shine a light through it and whistle to it (apparently sometimes they whistle back if the chick is developed enough). This one didn't whistle but you could see a chick in it when they shone a torch through it. Compared to the size of the bird the eggs are massive and this one was placed with the others in the incubator machine that turned them every hour or so.
The next part was to the new borns - they only had one but it was pretty small apart from it's feet which were massive. They are kept in incubators for a few days and then moved to the hatchery where they are fed a mixture of worms, cereal and fruit.
The last stop was the best part where they have three kiwis that are not going to be returned to the wild. They are in a separate nocturnal house this time just over a low wall from you and no glass.
They don't do much apart from eat and sleep but they're pretty cool to see up close and make afunny snuffling noise when they're looking for bugs.
By now it had finally stopped raining and continuing on the Kiwi cultural theme we then headed to Te Puia which is where you access the geysers in the Te Whakarewarewatanga (try that one after a couple of beers) thermal area.
On the way we passed Kuirau Park a free volcanic area near the centre of Rotorua. This most recently erupted in 2003 and apparently covered most of the park in boiling hot mud.
We didn't see any big spews but it was pretty good with thermal mineral pools that you could sit in and pools of boiling mud as well as lots of eggy smelling steam vents. It then started raining again so we headed off to Te Puia.
We booked to go to the Maori concert and for their nightly hangi and with this got a free tour of the geysers and thermal area. It does seem strange that the whole city is built on land that might explode at any moment but the people here don't seem overly concerned and they don't have any kind of volcano warning system in place.
Before the concert which was to be held in the Maori meeting house (Marae) we had to assemble with the other visitors and were taught a Maori song. "Someone" decided we should sit on the front row, so when the woman who had taught us the lyrics announced that she needed a Chief for the evening I became the obvious target. I then had to be taught the hongi - a nose to nose greeting with let rubbing then the Eskimos.
Apart from greeting the other chiefs there wasn't much to it until I had to get up on stage and learn how to do the haka.
After this we headed off for the hangi which was our dinner. The hangi traditionally was a mixture of meat and vegetables that were wrapped in baskets of flax and placed on top of some stones that had been heated in a fire for a few hours beforehand. The stones were covered with wet sacking and then the parcels of food followed by a covering of earth to seal in the steam.
These days due to Governement health & safety regulations they can't use the traditional method so our food was cooked in stainless steel containers that were heated inside some of the thermal vents - so still a bit different than a regular meal and very tasty !
On the way out of the park we had another trip past the geysers as they were going off again and the headed back to the van ready to move on tomorrow.
Where I stayed:
Rotorua Thermal Springs Campsite
Latest Comments (2)
|
Mankey Valley? (reply)
Mar 12, 2008 17:28 EST by snotface
Hmm the smell must remind you of St Helens on a wet day!!!!
Eddie would like you to bring him back a Kiwi for him to play with!!
Reckon Vyvyan could be a bleached maori chief? What with the moobs hehe (man boobs)
|
|
Tattoo (reply)
Mar 6, 2008 08:47 EST by grayanddan
Niggy, when are you getting your war tattoos on your face? I think it will look cool and you will certainlty look the hardest next time you go the brook!!! Or you may just go as crazy as mike tyson with stuff like that on your face!! Enjoy you time there, it looks fab. I am off to Portugal for the weekend, not quite Oz but better than nothong!!
Have fun D&G and Little M xx
|
 Post a new comment |
|
If you like this entry, search for other entries from New Zealand or try a new search. |
| |
Back to Entry - Back to Home
|
2 votes 
