Day 34 Taupo

---

Day 34 Taupo

We woke up to a brighter morning although the clouds still looked to have some rain. The first visit of the day was at Wai-O-Tapo an 18 sq km thermal area full of collapsed volcanic craters, bubbling mud pools and geysers. At 10.15am Lady Knox Geyser is made to erupt, she constantly pours out steam but when erupts she pours out water about 10 metres high. We were amazed at how long the eruption lasted, think it was due to the amount of water underground and there will have been a lot from the rainfall of the previous day, however she erupts for over an hour.

We spend a couple of hours walking round the park taking lots of pictures as there were many different sights to see before having lunch and heading south to Taupo. We call to see Huka Falls a fast flowing waterfall with bright blue water which is part of New Zealand's longest river.

Lake Taupo is New Zealand's largest lake and sits in the heart of the North Island. The 606 sq km lake is thought to be the trout fishing capital of the world and home to many water sports. The town of Taupo has a population of 21,000 and is positioned at the north east tip of the lake, it is very popular for visitors and is the centre for many adrenaline filled activities.

New Zealand created the bungy jump so we stopped at Taupo Bungy to watch people leap from a platform 20m out over a cliff and 47m high up above the river. With just their feet attached to a rope they jump, dip their heads into the water before springing back up a few times before being collected by a boat. It was a beautiful setting but still think we will give this one a miss.

While looking for a scenic lookout over Lake Taupo we came across a new housing development and feeling nosey we decided to call in and have a look at the show home. The sales woman behind the desk had moved here from Blackpool 10 years ago so we had an interesting chat with her.

This was an exclusive housing development that over looked the lake and all the houses have to be built to look individual. The show home was a 4 bedroom, 1 storey house with a decent size garden and a double garage. The cost was NZ $450,000 which we have worked out to be £160,000! The view could have been of Lake Windermere it is so similar and apparently you can ski on the mountains in winter. We have just instructed an estate agent to sell our house and hope to move here soon.

After another rainstorm the sky starts to clear so we head to De Bretts Thermal Resort where we park up for the night and make the most of the on site thermal spa facilities. We end up going for a dip twice as it is such a lovely place, the water must have been 40 decrees centigrade in one of the pools but some were cooler. It was very relaxing going in the dark and we also enjoyed the water slide!

For dinner we have sirloin steak cooked on the sites bbq and we cook pancakes in the van for supper, we are eating better than we do at home!

PS. It was a joke we aren't moving here yet, best finish the rest of the trip first!!!

---

Comments

[Maggie]

Sell sell sell....
You might have been joking about selling up and moving but your photos and descriptions were enough to convince me. Sounds fab New Zealand here I come!!!!