Road Trip to Rotoroa

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Eager to get on the road and see the country, I set off with two Dutch Hostel mates (Bo and Erwin) as they made their way south in a rental car bound for Queenstown. There were rumors of backpackers with cars to sell outside of the city on the cheap so I climbed into the Toyota Vitz (aka clown car)and we took off down the wrong side of the road! Haha The guys were pretty comical, all of Holland is basically flat so every hill we went over and every mountain we saw in the distance got a lot of laughing, clapping and high fives, all to the rhythm of German Techno. We drove thru Hamilton and stopped about 3 hours South of Auckland for a beer in Rotoroa. While we were there, our waitress keyed us in on an empty field on the outskirts of town that would be filling up with used cars for sale the following morning. The guys decided to hang around with me for the evening and we found beds available at the Base Hostel downtown.

Aside from 2nd hand car markets, Rotoroa is much better known for its thermal pools, botanical gardens, Lake Rotoroa, and its indigenous Maouri culture. The first evening I took a walk thru town to the Government Gardens which houses the Rotorua Museum (an old spa/mansion transformed), the Wangapipiro Hot Spring, a Polynesian Spa, croquet and bowling courts, and some expansive English-style gardens. The population is 35% Maori and the cultural influence on the city was apparent everywhere you looked. All entrances and walkways of the park were crowned with enormous wood carvings and throughout the gardens as well as the rest of the town, Maori art and smaller carvings could be found.

I had pizza and a couple beers with the guys back at the hostel and avoided the sounds of the music next door, calling it an early night. They were up and gone the next morning and left me on my own to haggle for a vehicle with the rest of the scheming travelers and locals. With an 'x marks the spot map' I headed off for the mysterious field and found it was next to a BMX track where I got to watch some kids practicing their moves as well as a couple nice wrecks. It was unexpected but needed entertainment to get me thru the day. After some long hours of test driving beat up old cars and sitting in the sun I called Bevin’s garage back in Auckland and asked them to hold the 1994 Subaru Legacy that I had driven a couple days earlier. The used car lot turned out to be a bust but the trip to Rotoroa was a good dose of local flavor.

I walked back into town and booked a bus for the following morning, switched hostels, and then wandered down to the the Ohinemutu area of the Lake Rotorua waterfront for the rest of the afternoon. There are was a tribal war party canoe (Te Arawa Waka Tara) on display and I spent some time checking out their work. It was decoratively carved, depicting two Maori Entities on the stern, the Tawhirimatea, controlling the elements, and Tumatauenga, the entity of war; and down the sides were charactertures of ancestral faces representing the generations of maori warriors. I walked back towards the governement gardens and along a public golf course where some elderly locals were hacking away in nothing but therir shorts! haha. I had been in the sun all day and it was getting late so I was looking forward to cooking dinner and having a quiet evening, but as I approached the hostel I knew this wouldn’t be the case. When I checked in, things were deserted and quiet, but apparently a local club had rented out the place for the night. BBQ was served and a good time was had by all. 😊

The following day was a long one, starting off with a 7am bus ride back to Auckland, finding a bank to give me the cash, organizing insurance, transferring the title, etc., and then driving back down to Taupo, which is an hour south east of Rotoroa. All worth it now though, as my 'throw-back' Subaru Wagon can take me down any dirt road I choose!

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Comments

[mom]

Great pics -wondering if I can print off a pic of you?? Can that happen? Love you, baby!!