Forbes Family Blog: New Zealand Part 2

Letter No. 232

Dear all,

NEW ZEALAND’S NORTH ISLAND – Rotorua, Taupo & Wellington

We left Hamilton on Tues 5^th January and drove to Rotorua. Our first stop was Hell’s Gate, a highly active thermal area which has a fantastic thermal spa. You hop into a large pool of hot mud and smear it all over your body and then sit on the edge of the pool in the sun to let it dry on your skin. You can only stay in the mud pool for 20 minutes as it is so warm. Next you rinse off and then gradually move through a series of other pools gradually getting cooler and clearer. The mud bath and hot springs were great and we all thought our skin felt much softer afterwards, probably because the outer layers were removed by the acidic waters! It was a fun morning, despite the constant smell of sulphur dioxide gas in the air which pervades much of the region around Rotorua. We ate lunch at the cafe before driving to our apartment.

After lunch and checking in we went on to Skyline Rotorua. This is a large cable car you can catch up the mountain behind the city. At the top there are lots of activities to do. We all went on the luge which is a little go kart track. You ride down the mountain to the bottom and then get a chairlift back to the top. There were three different tracks and we had to try them all. It was great fun and we could have done it all day. We went back to our apartment for dinner and had another shower to try to get the smell of sulphur out of our skin!

The next morning we drove around to the other side of Lake Rotorua to the Kaituna Falls where Matt, Jessie and I went White Water Rafting. Jessica was fairly concerned and not sure she wanted to go, especially when she heard we would be rafting over a 7-metre waterfall. Apparently this is the highest commercially rafted waterfall in the world. We had a 30-minute safety briefing which included details of what to do if you fell out and what to do if the raft capsized and you were trapped under it. By this time Jessica was really freaked out and I thought that she might bail out, but with one last hug for Katie we were in the rafts paddling down the fast flowing river. The rapids were awesome and we were having a great time but were all a little nervous about the huge waterfall downstream. There were quite a few opportunities to get out of the raft and swim alongside which was fun as the water was quite warm. Very soon we were at the top of the waterfall and given last-minute reminders on where to hold on, how to stop crashing heads together and what to do if we capsized. Over we went – the raft was fully vertical down the falls and in an instant we were at the bottom. The raft, with all of us in it, submerged totally to a depth of around 1m before we popped back to the surface. It was a huge thrill. Meanwhile Katie was walking alongside the falls taking photos of us all the way. She said it was a lovely walk along the river and she took some great pictures. All too soon we were back in the minibus then back to the rafting centre to clean off and warm up before going back to our apartment.

In the afternoon we went out to Whakarewarewa Forest to see the Californian giant redwood trees. There was a lovely 1½ hour walk through the forest up to a lookout over Lake Rotorua and back. There are a lot of cycle trails in the area but we decided that a gentle stroll would be a relaxing change after the morning’s high-energy activity. That evening we went to the Mitai Maori Village for a Maori cultural experience. We were picked up from our apartment for a short drive to the village. It was an authentic introduction to Maori culture which left us amazed and in awe. At least that is what it said in the brochure. Actually it was pretty good. There was a short walk in the forest to a stream where Maori warriors paddled a war canoe along the stream wearing traditional dress and singing war cries. There was a full performance highlighting traditional dress, arts, weapons, customs, carvings, tattoos, songs and musical instruments. We also went to see the traditional Hangi feast being extracted from the pit in the ground before we went on to devour a huge meal of roast lamb and chicken. We were a little surprised to see such traditional Maori foods as garlic bread, stuffing, mint sauce, pavlova and chocolate log but it was certainly a feast and we all had a great night. The kids befriended a 27-year-old backpacker from Taiwan and practiced their Mandarin on her all evening, which was an added bonus.

On Thursday 7 January we got up early and drove to Matamata, about an hour away, to Hobbiton, the set for the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit movies. It is a sheep farm about 10km outside the town. Thirty-nine Hobbit holes were originally built of untreated timber, ply and polystyrene. A large oak tree was cut down and transported to the site to overlook the village. Artificial leaves were imported from Taiwan and over 200,000 leaves were individually wired to the tree by hand!! A mill and a double-arch bridge were also built out of scaffolding, ply and polystyrene. The whole thing was demolished following filming of the Lord of the Rings trilogy but was then rebuilt with permanent materials, including a new artificial tree built from steel and silicon, in time for The Hobbit trilogy. This reconstruction took two years and the whole site is now a vast money-making exercise for a once simple farmer. We did a two hour tour which was really fantastic, especially as we had an incredibly enthusiastic and entertaining guide who was passionate about the movies and seemed to know every trivial fact about them. The tour took us around the lovely Hobbit holes, along the winding paths, past the maypole where the kids joined the maypole dance and ended up in the Green Dragon pub for a cider. It was really lovely. Matt and Jessie hadn’t particularly enjoyed the movies, but they loved the tour. The hobbit holes were built at different sizes proportionally so that actors being filmed next to them either looked larger (Gandalf), or smaller (Hobbits). It was very clever. The Green Dragon pub had delicious pies and the décor was really great. We would have liked to stay longer but we only had twenty minutes for photos, drinks and snack. It was really a great morning. We will have to watch the movies again now and see if we can spot the places we have seen.

We went back to Rotorua and had a late lunch at our apartment. In the afternoon we meandered around the town, stopping at the park which was riddled with thermal vents and mud pools. There was even a thermal foot pool so we stopped for a while and soaked our feet in the warm water. That evening we discovered the Eat Street night market which had every possible kind of street food. We then we strolled back to our apartment to watch one of the kids’ Christmas movies on DVD.

We packed up and left Rotorua the next morning, heading for the Wai-o-tapu Thermal Wonderland. The Lady Knox Geyser spouts off at precisely 10:15am every day and shoots water to a height of about 20m for about an hour. The geyser receives a little help in the form of organic soap which allows it to erupt to such a regular timetable. The soap reduces the surface friction of the top layer and causes the spout. It was very powerful and much more impressive than we had expected it to be. We walked around the Wai-o-tapu thermal area, which is a steaming moonscape of collapsed craters, boiling pools of mud, poisonous pools and sulphurous fumaroles. In some places the water temperatures are up to 300 degrees centigrade. There are many different coloured pools including green, orange, purple, red, yellow, white and black. We especially liked a bright green pool called the Devil's Bath. There is a thin layer of poisonous gas over the green water and if birds fly into it they are gassed, fall into the water and are dissolved in a few days by the high acid content. Our other favourite was the Champagne Pool, a 65m diameter pool which is also 65m deep and full of crystal clear boiling water. Vast clouds of warm sulphurous steam envelope you at the viewing areas. It was pretty cool and we could imagine it as the film setting for lots of futuristic movies. There was a 4km walk around all the sites in the park and we did it all. Just as we finished it started to rain so we ate lunch in the car. On our way out of the area we passed the aptly-named Mud Pool which was basically a huge pond of boiling mud.

We drove on to Taupo and found our kitchenette apartment. It was still bucketing down rain when we arrived. Despite this we decided to go to the Spa Thermal Park which had a hot water stream flowing into the Waikato River. It was a short drive and a five minute walk to the river. The kids and I went in and it was lovely. We sat in a pool of very hot water and then jumped into the river to cool down. Katie watched and took photos under her umbrella but ended up getting nearly as wet as we did. We went back to dry off and have showers before heading into the town for dinner. My brother-in-law Andrew had told us of a great place to go for dinner called the Pub ‘n’ Grub. It was much nicer than it sounds and we had a nice dinner.

On Saturday 9^th January we had a sailing trip planned on a boat called The Barbary. I went for an early morning run on Saturday to find the harbour front and departure point. It was overcast and threatening rain but fortunately by the time we’d had breakfast and driven down to the harbour it had turned into a miraculously beautiful day with not a cloud in the sky. The Barbary boat was very impressive. It was a 44ft sailing yacht built in 1905. It had once belonged to Errol Flynn who had won her in a card game. Our half day sail was taking us right out onto Lake Taupo to see the Maori Rock Carvings on a cliff overlooking the lake. It was about an hour’s sail each way and it got quite exciting once we were out of the harbour. We had to stow all the bags below deck and there was a very heavy swell. The kids and I stood right at the bowspit and as the boat went through the swell we would go up about 4m above the water to come crashing back down into water to our knees. It was great fun. The boat got up some fair speed and was right on its side with water lapping over our feet and we were lying almost vertically as she sped through the water. Very exciting.

The rock carvings were very spectacular but I was a little disappointed to find out they had been carved in 1979 by some drunken Maori Art students. There was a huge Maori face, an impressive lizard and a naked women who was supposedly one of their girlfriends! It was pretty good but I had been expecting something really ancient!

We sailed on to a quiet bay around the headland and Matt, Jessie and I went swimming. The water was a crystal clear blue colour but very cold. I was the first in and told everyone that it was quite warm, through gritted teeth, despite the fact I could hardly speak from hypothermia. I even convinced two other people to get in! It was actually quite refreshing but we didn't stay in too long. We had a nice hot chocolate and lay in the sun while we sailed back to port. There were lovely bean bags to lie on all over the deck and the wind had dropped so it was a much more gentle sail on the return leg. A highly recommended morning out in Taupo.

We had a nice picnic lunch on the harbour then a short drive down the river to the Aratiatia Dam. There is a release of water from the dam four times a day and the water level rises spectacularly in the narrow riverbed downstream, creating powerful rapids in which the river rises by about 6 metres in just 10 minutes. We just made it in time for the 2pm release. Afterwards we went on to a Volcanic Activity Centre which showed short films of recent eruptions and earthquakes in New Zealand as well as a simulator showing what the ground motions would have been like in the Christchurch earthquake. It was quite alarming.

Afterwards we viewed the spectacular Huka Falls waterfall and then drove to a nearby activity centre to watch people Bungy jumping and going on a "Big Swing" from a cliff over the river. We decided that we were not at all keen on Bungy jumping but enjoyed watching others do it. We went back to our apartment and had dinner in and a TV evening.

The next day was mainly a driving day as we drove 382km from Taupo to Wellington. It was 382km and took us 5½ hrs, including a lunch stop in Paraparamau Beach with a view of Kapiti Island. On the way we got to 1089 metres above sea level, on the slopes of Mt Ruapehu, which is the tallest mountain in New Zealand at 2797m. There was quite a lot of snow on it despite it being mid-summer and the landscape was very bleak and cold. Mt Ruapehu is the most active volcano on the North Island and we saw quite a bit of smoke coming out of the summit.

We arrived at our apartment by 2:30pm. It was a great location almost in the centre of Wellington. After we dropped the girls off, Matthew and I went to find a car park for the car and stumbled across the lovely beach Oriental Bay where we had a refreshing swim in the very cool water. In the evening we explored the town, having a drink on harbour front at Queens Wharf and then on to Cuba Street for dinner. Cuba Street is a very hip area with bars, restaurants and lots of street art. In fact there is lots of great street art everywhere in Wellington and we really liked it. The city felt much more vibrant and humming than Auckland.

Our last full day in New Zealand was Monday 11^th January. We strolled a few blocks from our apartment down to the Te Papa Museum of New Zealand. My brother-in-law Chris had told us this was the best thing to do in Wellington and he wasn't wrong. It was a fantastic museum right on the harbour front with wonderful displays of volcanoes, earthquakes, natural history and New Zealand social history including immigration, refugees and Maori History. There was a very interesting exhibit on the Waitangi Treaty between the British and the Maori Chiefs.

We had lunch overlooking the harbour and watched some girls leaping into the sea from a jumping platform. It was about a 10m high platform called The Jump constructed above the harbour front especially for people to leap off. It was very beautifully constructed so it looked like a piece of art as well as being a functional platform. Naturally the kids immediately wanted to do it so we said we would come back later in the day. We then drove a short distance to the New Zealand Parliamentary complex. Three buildings form the complex and the most distinctive of these is the modernist executive office known as the Beehive. It does look exactly like a beehive and it is the architectural symbol of New Zealand, even though it is not great architecture! Next door to the Beehive is the old Parliament House, which was completed in 1922, and next door is a Neolithic Parliamentary Library Complex. We did a one-hour tour of all three buildings.

In the afternoon we drove up to the Mount Victoria Lookout behind our apartment. It had fantastic 360 degree views all around Wellington. The drive up was along some very narrow and winding streets which was an adventure in itself. After we had finished admiring the view we went back to our apartment, grabbed our togs and went back to The Jump. One platform was at about 5m above the water level and the other at 10m. There was a large audience of spectators cheering people on which was a bit intimidating. We had a few practice jumps from the lower platform before doing the taller jump. Jessie was really brave and leapt straight off the top level without a thought. I had to take a moment before the big leap, but I couldn't let her be braver than me! We did quite a few jumps and it was great fun in the end.

Our last day in New Zealand was Tuesday 12^th January. We packed up and checked out of our apartment before going to the Wellington Cable Car which took us high up into the hills overlooking Wellington. There were spectacular views and a tiny museum on the history of the cable car. We spent an hour walking down through the lovely Botanic Gardens and then stopped for lunch in a rather quirky floating boat restaurant overlooking Oriental Bay. We headed on to the airport for our flight back to Brisbane; the end of another terrific touring holiday.

Cheers,

Derek, Katie, Matthew, Jessica & Molly