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Published: April 4th 2008
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With only a few days left in New Zealand we had to make the most of our time, so we took a VERY scenic route to Rotorua in order to visit the glow worm caves in Waitomo on the way. The caves were about a two or three hour drive from Taupo, and it was at least that long again on to Rotorua. But they were well worth it. The Waitomo region is home to an incredible network of caves, the ones we visited are the most well known. As part of a guided tour we were brought through the caves wide caverns, including the high ceilinged Cathedral Cavern, where musical performances are sometimes held! The caves themselves were beautiful, but the highlight of the tour comes at the end when you board a boat that floats down an underwater river within the cave and the entire ceiling is lit up by tiny glow worms. It was absolutely magical, we all loved it.
Onwards to Rotorua, where we had an NIGHTMARE trying to find accomodation, mainly because it was Easter weekend. I could not count the amount of hostels and motels we went to - we eventually ended up in the
Arryan Motel, a dodgy operation run by a tiny chinaman. Rotorua is a centre of thermal activity and landscapes, and as a result the entire place STINKS! Even within our room there was a nasty eggy smell permeating everywhere. Yuk!
Despite the smell, Rotorua (which is a nice town, even if it was chockers for the entire weekend) is on a equal par to Queenstown when it comes to activities. You can do everything here including Zorbing - which myself and Sib did on Saturday afternoon. There's only one other place in the world where you can do zorbing, although I'm not really sure why it's so rare! It basically involves being strapped into a giant inflated see-through ball and being rolled down the hill. There's a wet version, where you not strapped in and a gallon of water is thrown in on top of you so you can slosh your way down. But me and Sib opted for the dry Zorb - Sib was first; you have to hop into the "Zorb" through a small hole on the side, then you have a kind of seat to sit in while you're strapped in. Once all that's done - wha
hey! - the barrier is released and off you roll. Sib screamed the whole way down, and when it came to my turn all I could do was laugh as I rolled in 360 degrees revolutions, completely without control. When you reach the bottom (which doesn't take long at all) you're left strapped in like a trapped Daddy Long Legs for a few seconds before one of the attendants comes to your rescue. Very funny expedition altogether.
It was Sibby's birthday that day so we booked a Maori Cultural Experience for that evening to kick off the celebrations (or commiserations - is 25 really something to celebrate??). We were picked up from our motel and brought out to the Tamaki Maori village, about 20 minutes outside town. Our bus driver was this fantastic Maori guy who kept us entertained, and warned us that we'd have to sing a song from our home countries on the way back. (On the way out we thought we were far too cool for school to take part in any such activity, but oh, how things changed!) Upon arrival at the village we gathered round and waited, a little nervously, for the tribe to greet
us. We had been warned not to smile or laugh or make any sudden gestures during the welcome dance, as this would be considerable highly disrespectful. One by one a number of highly decorated and scantily clad men emerged from the entrance to the village, waving their sticks, bulging their eyes and sticking out their tongues, all the while chanting and stamping their feet. Four men from the various tour groups had been selected to represent us, the "visiting" tribes, and the poor feckers had to stand there while these guys came straight up to their faces taunting them and generally looking vey scary. This went on for several minutes, then some female members of the tribe sang a welcome song and we were officially allowed to enter the village. It's set out as a replica to a pre-European village, and we had a few minutes to wander around to observe different homesteads and rituals. It was all incredibly well done, and there was one particularly strapping warrier who got a nod of approval from every female member of the audience. I've never seen such thighs! Beautiful, quite quite Beautiful. I think he had a bit of an ugly face,
but it was covered in warpaint and we were so distracted by the rest of him that it really didn´t matter!
We were led on to a concert area, where members of the tribe performed a number of different songs, and again this was excellent. Then came the food - the reason surely that we had all came! A huge banquet was laid out for us with mountains of nosh, much of which was supposed to have been cooked on a traditional "hangi" (Hot stones, fire, water - the usual). Now I have no idea if any of the food had ever even seen a hot stone, but I do know it tasted deeee-lish-us! And I'm fairly confident that the pavola for dessert was produced using more conventional methods. I really don´t function well in "all you can eat" situations (I blame my father), and true to form I completely stuffed myself.
But the evening wasn't over yet....no no! We still had our bus ride home to look forward to! I should add at this stage that we were the only girls in our 20s on the aforementioned bus, and most of our fellow travellers were a few age brackets
ahead of us. None the less, everyone agreed to sing a song (The Aussies down the back started it off with Waltzing Matilda, so there we were free from the pressure of originality), and when it came to our turn we bashed out a fairly respectable version of Molly Malone (I make no apologies for the cheese factor - we were LOVING it), and I must say we received the loudest round of applause! Even when everyone was finished the bus driver kept the singing going, and at one stage he drove us round a roundabout about seven times while belting out "She´ll be coming round the mountain when she comes!" Claud, in particular, nearly died laughing.
By the time he had dropped us to the door of the pub we were going to, we had officially christened him the Best Bus Driver in the Universe. Unfortunately our evening was cut much shorter than we would have liked - all the pubs closed at 12 cos it was Easter Saturday. What a disgrace! And this on the night of Sabrina Sherlock´s 25th birthday. Well I never. We tried in vain to get back into the bar we were in after
it closed, but only residents of the adjoining hostel were permitted, so we reluctantly flagged a taxi and went back to our smelly motel.
We checked out the next morning and headed for the Waiotapu Thermal Reserve, which is this crazy area of mental volcanic landscapes - acid green lakes, geysers, giant smouldering crators, all that jazz. After that it was on to the buried village of Te Wairoa, which turned out to be a total joke. The village was completely buried in a volcano about 130 years ago, and we were hoping for some sort of mini Pompeii with houses intact and what not. Not so much! Main problem being, the village really was destroyed, and all that seemed to be preserved was a few feckin wine bottles from the local hotel! The little museum bit which explained the story at the beginning was mildly interesting, but the rest of it was just a waste of a good walk. So we hit the minty highway and drove as far as a little town called Tauranga on the East Coast, and stayed in a weird motel that actually had a sign in its reception requesting that "Shoes must be warn
in the restuarant." Nothing but the best for us ladies.
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