Roturua - Gateway to Geyserland

Hi,

Well we arrived in Rotorua in the evening of Friday 22nd May. As soon as we drove into the town a strong smell of sulphur hit us and it took a few minutes for us to figure out what it was until we saw all the steam rising from various cracks in the footpaths and other sulphur pools around the town. Tired we drove around for a long time looking for somewhere to camp for the night, but arriving by dark to a new place always proves difficult, we eventually found a spot by Lake Rotorua to camp for the night. The Rotorua district has 16 lakes in total, some private and still belonging to traditional Maori tribes. The town itself is situated midway along a volcanic faultline and hence consists of plenty of geothermal activity; geysers, boiling springs, mud pools and silica terraces, we couldn't wait for Saturday to explore what we had only heard or read about. We drove into the town on Saturday morning and stopped off at a public park where we saw steam rising from the mud pools, it was an amazing sight, they were all fenced off for safety reasons but you could see where some new pools and steam vents had been created around the edges of the fences. The smell of sulphur was awful but it didn't seem to bother the other people there so presumably it gets tolerable with time. A farmers market was in full swing in the park so naturally we browsed around and endulged in one too many lamb kebabs. With signs pointing in all directions for spas and parks, we decided it would be best to visit the Information Centre for some advice. Rotorua is so tourist orientated and with such an abundance of tours and destinations from Hells Gate, the Buried Village, Paradise Valley Springs, Rainbow Springs, Te Puia and so much more, the guy at the desk gave us some brochures and a card for a free beer (how nice of him!), so off we went to the Pig & Whistle pub around the corner to make our decision over a cold one. We decided to visit Te Puia that afternoon, the centre offers a view of the Te Whakarewarewa Geothermal Valley and is also home to the New Zealand Maori Arts & Crafts Institute. First stop was the Kiwi house here we were marvelled at the size of the birds and how mobile they were for such awkward looking things. We then followed the trail up to Pohutu Geyser which was in the middle of an eruption and stood there in awe for a while at how amazing these vents are, this particular geyser regualrly shoots steam 30m into the air about 20 times a day. The place has so much to offer but with not enough time we missed out on the Maori storytelling and dances and the Hangi (their traditional Maori feast), we walked around and admired the many boling sulphurous pools, steam vents, dormant geysers, bubbling mud pools and old cooking pools. The Maori tribes used to use these to their advantage for both cooking meals and bathing. We walked around the craft school where we saw weavers and carvers in action and the craft shop where we oogled over handcarved Maori pieces, and wondered how we might get a big table or ornament home but on seeing the price tag put the idea on hold for a year or that! (10 maybe). Before leaving we went back to the Pohutu Geyser and its smaller neighbour the Prince of Wales Geyser (both erupt almost simultaneously) and waited patiently for their next fantastic display. That evening we found a nice spot in the public park to camp for the night, thinking we were going to have a quiet night we were slighly disturbed when we caught a man trying to spy on us, creeping in the bushes like a nosey neighbour prowling. We think that he thought he was incognito but the porch light behind him illuminated his silhouette and he was no more hidden than the full moon that night!. On Sunday, Diarmuid woke up enthusiastically and went straight to the fishing shop to buy a rod in advance of our plans to go further south to the fishing district of Lake Toupo on Monday. It rained for most of that day so we drove out of Rotorua, and parked up at a viewpoint between two lakes, the Green Lake (Rotokahai) and the Blue Lake (Tikitapu), unfortunately the viewpoint wasn't much of one and you had to run from one side of the car park to see the Green Lake and the other to see the Blue Lake which were, probably due to the rain, neither blue nor green. To get a closer look at the lake shores we took a walk through the Redwood forest where we saw some partridges, we were afraid to venture too close to the lakes though as the green one is privately owned by a local Hapu subtribe and they are very serious when it comes to protecting their land and 'leaving it as you found it'. We debated over going to Wai-O-Tapu Thermal Wonderland to see the Lady Knox Geyser but decided against it as it would be very similar to Te Puia but only erupts each morning at 10am. Instead we planned to go to Waimangu Volcanic Valley the next morning so we drove down near it and visited Rainbow Mountain where we walked up to a lookout point and into a crater below the multi coloured mountain. Later we camped by Lake Okaru where Diarmuid got to do some dusk fishing. Waimangu Volcanic Valley was out of this world, it is the newest geothermal valley in the world, created when nearby Tarawera Volcano erupted in 1886 and is now absolutely spectacular. We took the trail past the the Echo Crater and Frying Pan Lake, the Inferno Crater that rises and falls regularly, the amazing Warbrick terraces and up the Mt Haszard Hiking Trail were we looked out over Lake Rotomahana and saw Mt Tarawera in the distance. Up at the viewpoint on the top of the mountain is a photograph of the same view you are looking at but taken about a century ago, it was amazing to compare how the native forest had been regenerated, how some land had been newly formed and how the lakes had covered what used to be land below Mt Tarawera. To see the famous pink and white terraces that were destoyed by the eruption you now have to take a boat out on the lake. On the way down the trail we saw our first couple of Wallabys, they just jumped out of the bush accross the path in front of us, probably giving us more of a fright than they got!. Overall the valley was one of the highlights of our trip and somewhere we will never forget. Pleased with our very educational ecotrail we headed south on the Thermal Explorer Highway to Lake Toupo...

---

---