The lakes

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After leaving a very wet East Cape we headed in land to try and escape the rain. We made a quick stop in Whakatane, though not for long as it was still raining. We then cut through the hills towards Taupo. In order to spend a day around the lake we stopped overnight before we got to Lake Taupo at Awakeri Hot Springs. It was quite a small campsite but it had hot spring swimming pools that were partly under cover. So when the rain eased enough we headed over to them. They were absolutely delightful and even when it started raining again it didn’t really matter because the water was so warm the rain actually had a cooling effect!! The only problem with the campsite was that all the hot water was a direct feed from the hot spring so was basically pure sulphur - so a shower didn’t really make you clean again!!

We got up early and headed towards Taupo, with a stop off at Huka Falls first. These are massive and sound amazing. There is an extraordinary amount of water flowing through the falls as they are on the only river to flow out of Lake Taupo. There is a large number of rivers which flow into the lake but this is the only one out!! We walked alongside the river for a while and found a very friendly fantail who played about in the tree next to us until too many people had gathered and it flew away. The river was really clear and appeared really calm the further away from the falls you got due to the width of the river. I had heard about a hot water stream which was free to go to and was where a natural hot spring flowed down to meet the river, so we headed there. We didn’t go in as there was a group of people already there and it just felt really busy so after this we headed into Taupo itself. The view across the lake is wonderful with a view of the mountains and active volcano - although no smoke today thankfully. We wandered around the town for a while which seems to have a real backpacker / uni student feel about it. We drove around the lake looking for somewhere to stay and found a place at Motutere. It seemed to be busy with lots of caravans and holiday chalets on it, however there wasn’t another soul around. We had the entire campsite to ourselves and didn’t see any one else until the following morning!! It was really bazaar but had a lovely view over the lake. We wandered around the lakes edge in the morning before heading off to complete our circuit around Lake Taupo.

After this we went to Rotorua for a quick stop. We stopped briefly in town before heading to the thermal park. This was quite an awesome sight. Its an area of natural geothermal area which has been left open and free to the public rather than one of the many places that you have to pay to get into and walk around to see what is essentially a natural environment. So we spent quite a while wandering around the thermal park seeing all the hot pools and the mud pool, and I stopped to have a quick foot spa in the sun!

We still have a few days before we need to be at Steve’s so we are going to head up to the Coromandel peninsula, so we have just arrived in Whangamata. Its late and the owners of the campsite are out and have left the park open so we have chosen a spot and will see them in the morning!!

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