water and food....

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This is only going to be a short blog because i cant really be bothered to write much and also because i didnt do that much in rotorua

it started off with me and Lucy getting there on a sunday. we did nothing..........

the next day we book two things to do, one was white water rafting and the other was to go to this maori experiance night.

we did the white water rafting the next day (monday incase you werent paying attention) we got picked up for this at around 12:30 pm and drove to their base. from here we got changed into our dashing wetsuits.

then we got into the van and drove to the river. along the way we found out we would be rafting down three water falls and the grades of them were, 3, 4, and 5....they also told us that grade 6 was classified as unraftable (I.E. niagra falls) although when we booked this we did know that at some point we would be rafting over a 7 metre waterfall.

we got into the boats after a maori pray to the river and they taught us about different things we had to do, like get down and hold on.....

we then set off. We werent on the water for as long as i would have liked as straight away we were upon the first two waterfalls the 2 metre one and the 1.5 metre one just slightly infront of each other. we got down these fine and rafted on a bit further. after a while we came to the major one the grade 5, 7 metre waterfall. and we went over again what to do if i.e. the boat flipped or, you fell out. Then we went first over the waterfall.

At this point in the story i think it might be best to say that there were two boats and Lucy was in a different one to me, so we went over the waterfall at different times. I would also like to add that anyone with a weak heart might want to stop reading :P

back to the story....

we went first, and it went horribly wrong. i fell out. but i wasnt the only one, three others did as well. We were told if you fall out then let go of your paddle and curl up into a ball, your "life jacket" will bring you up sooner or later. At this moment in time i was under the water with 18 gallons of water falling on me everysecond holding me down, and i wished the jacket would bring me up sooner rather then later. when i did surface i couldnt see the boat until i heard a call from behind me and i was pulled into a boat with people i didnt know (It turned out to be another rafting companys) after i had found my paddle i had to climb back into my boat and we carried on, after watching Lucys boat come down perfectly.

i would also like to say at this point in the story that most of the guides said that the angle we started to go down the waterfall would had flipped us anyway its only the fact thats we had some really big guy on our boat that his weight was able to pull the boat back up level.


the rest of the rafting went fine and we all got out alive.....that i know of.

later that evening we went to this maori concert, where we watched the maori perform and also had a feast. which they cooked in a whole in the ground?!? the food was amazing and i couldnt even finish the very big plate i got for myself :D

after this we went for a walk around the site, and i realised that i hate people with torches. they gave us torches because it was dark and it was like people had never used them before as they kept leaving them on and waving them around....

well i have run out of things to say, we saw more glowworms on the walk, and some trees. then went back to hostel, it was very fun but i just dont have the energy to write anymore so there......

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Photos

our feast
cooking in the ground.....i dont think it will catch on....