Rotoruae

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Finally going to get caught up. long ride here yesterday. Took about 6 hours, but we had some fun stops. First of all i was amazed how quickly the street department personnel got the barriers down. There when I went to bed at 10:30, gone by 7 am. We made a few stops including Happy Houses. lunch and finally a shop for hokey-pokey ice cream. It reminded me a lot of our butter brickle, but the chips were less crunchy. The town we stopped in used to be one of those drive-through towns. We all know what they are, places that do not stick out much and you are through in the blink of an eye. Well, some smart entrepreneur decided to make use of left over corrugated metal sheets and make sculptures on top of buildings to slow people down and get them to see what was available. Even the Catholic Church got involved.There is a corrugated three-dimensional figure of St Peter in the front corner of their property. The ice cream and souvenir shop were between the heads of a large white dog and a sheep. I am talking one and a half stories here. And they are only a few of these art objects, there were many more throughout the main thoroughfare. Right before we got into Rotorua, we stopped for a short hike through the redwoods here. They were originally imported from California because it was felt that the climate, soil and precipitation would be good for growing. They were right about the growing, the trees grew like wildfire. The only problem was that because the conditions were so great for growing, the tree became more porous and not the hardwood they wanted for their lumber industry. Still they are mighty impressive, there is a big stand right outside the city. some are super tall, but not strong. Then onto a short coach tour of the city, the hotel, laundry, dinner and sleep. Today is the last day here.

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