Stink and plop

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In volcanic Rotorua - you smell the sulphur before you reach the town - we dove straight into Maori culture attending a hangi (Maori feast cooked in a buried earth oven) complete with scary Maori welcome (think the All Blacks haka with less clothes, more fire and sharp weapons) and a nightime visit to some natural sacred springs (home to various eels and trout).

We also visited a village buried in the 1886 eruption of Mount Tarawera (which is still being excavated) and spent the best part of a day at the amazing Wai-O-Tapo thermal reserve (plopping and boiling mud pools, craters, steam and gas).

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