TAURANGA

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31.1.2013



Had a fun dinner with our usual mob last night! Had a fairly early night as we had to be up fairly early for our tour out of Tauranga to Rotarua. Being on late sitting for dinner (8p.m.)it is 10.00 – 10.30 before you know it. Ten of us on our tour of Tauranga to Rotarua, 6 Germans from St Albanks and us 4, they were a friendly bunch and our tour guide Dennis looked after us all very well. Had a bit of a tour around Tauranga and headed to Kiwi 360 where we tasted the different types of Kiwi fruit, juice and also kiwi fruit wine (yes wine again) and then on towards Rotarua taking in the Green and Blue Lakes, then to a very fast flowing river to see the white water rafters. Then to the Whakaremwaewa Thermal reserve and Maori Arts and Cultural Centre – this was very new to us a very interesting, saw the geyser in full force – we were lucky as by the time we left the area it had died right down to nearly nothing - Dennis says because they haven’t had a lot of rain recently the pressure dies down for a couple of hours. Saw a performance in the cultural centre and then the bubbling hot mud pools, then headed to the Backyard Pub in town for lunch. Had a very enjoyable Speights dark beer with our lunch. 2.30p.m. time to see the rest of town and head back to Tauranga and onto the ship. Tauranga very pretty seaside resort type place with lots of restaurants and bars along the foreshore, hundreds of yachts and boats in the two marinas we saw – could spend a few days here.

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