We've now reached Rotorua - a very geothermally active area, in other words it smells of eggs and there are lots of steaming ponds, bubbling pools of mud and the occaisonal geyser around. We have wandered around the town's park and marvelled at all the smelly, boiling ponds and today headed out to "thermal wonderland" to see even more, it's all very picturesque - see the photos in the gallery...
Spas
Even better than all that are the spas around here. People used to travel here from all over to "take the cure" but it's all a bit more recreational now and we've been trying some spas out just in case were not properly wound down and relaxed enough yet. On Sunday we spent a couple of hours at the Polynesian Spa, alternating between four outdoor mineral rock pools at different temperatures, over looking the lake, lovely jubbly. Best of all though was today's "spa", - Kerosene Creek which is just a litle thermal river with a hot pool under a waterfall. It was so hot that i could only sit in it for about ten minutes. It's not a tourist attraction as such because it's so small and there are no sign posts for it but it was beautiful and definitely a highlight of the trip so far.
Lakes
There are loads of lakes round here, we're camping next to one called Blue Lake - very pretty and popular with swimmers and kids. We went swimming in another nearby lake yesterday and another novel experience - swimming with ducks - honestly it was just me and the mallards. (see photos).
Sun
The sun is incredibly strong here so of course, Eoin is looking gorgeous, brown as a berry and i'm looking, well, very english. None of the famous Rodda sun burn though due to my extensicve sun screen routines. I thought i detected a change in colour on my feet but since it washed off I can only assume it was dust that stuck to my sun screen. I am now kitted out with a sun hat and a swimming top that covers me from neck to elbows. I had hoped that since II bought it in a surf shop I would look like a surf chick but alas, they don't make surf chicks in my colour so I look more like those kids you seee on holiday with their cover all swim suits.
Walks
We've been on some lovely walks recently but they all seem to be uphill - we'll have buns of steel by the time we leave this country. When we stayed on the coast we walked up a hill called Mount Manganui - great views from the top of miles of beaches. Since arriving in Rotorua we've done a couple of great walks in the forest but far too fast for my likings, O'Briens you can sympathise here, I spend the whole time trailing behind Eoin. The forests here are lovely (and shady!) - the Redwood Pines here were planted over a hundred years ago and apparently are about 60m tall.
Camping
The camping is still going well despite a cold night on Sunday night I now go to bed armed with my $10 tracksuit pants and $14 fleece though I'm too embarrassed to walk to the shower blocks dressed like that. Haircare and camping do not seem to go hand in hand so I do look like a witch a lot of the time now.
So that's all my news for now...have a look at the pictures and please admire my boling mud photo, it took me absoutely ages to take it!
