After leaving Wellington, we had to drive over to the east coast of the North Island to Hawkes Bay -- wine country. It was a lovely scenic drive, like usual. Our accommodation was yet another Top 10 Holiday Park, our standby. We stay in the "standard cabin", which has 2 sets of bunkbeds. We share a kitchen and bathroom facilities with the other campers. Not so bad, but some are nicer than others. I wouldn't have ranked this one in Hastings all that high, until we left behind Brody's tablet. They've been very helpful in trying to get it back to us.
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| The National Aquarium |
Our stay was just for one night, and the next morning on our way to Napier we stumbled upon the Hastings Sunday Market. It was fantastic! We all found a special treat there: Brody, a crepe; Jack, a waffle; Bill, a fresh blueberry ice cream cone; and me, a fresh squeezed carrot-apple-ginger juice. We bought bacon, cheese, yogurt, berries, sprouted muesli (mmmm...), and some sweets to take with us. Honestly, if you're ever in Hastings on a Sunday you should definitely check it out!
Napier is the Art Deco capital of NZ. The place was pretty much destroyed by an earthquake in the 30s, so everything was rebuilt in the style of the day. It was quite a pretty town. We went to the National Aquarium there, which wasn't as impressive as it sounds. They claimed to have kiwis, but we saw only their enclosure. Boo. I liked the big sea turtle best, Bill liked the little penguins, and the boys liked the shark enclosure. It was one of those ones where they swim above you. Neat.
From Napier, we had a longish drive to Taupo (and the geothermic region) where we had lunch. Taupo is another of those rather touristy (for a reason) spots, with lots of shops and restaurants and hotels. The town surrounds Lake Taupo which is actually a huge volcanic crater. They say Taupo erupted 2000 years ago and the eruption was recorded as far away as Rome and China. Bits of Taupo are all over the North Island.
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| The Tongariro Crossing, that didn't happen |
The next part of our tale is a sad one. We were scheduled to do the Tongariro Crossing the next day. This was our epic hike across Mt Doom into Mordor (sort of), but IT SNOWED at above 1300m! All of the shuttle buses were cancelled. I was pretty disappointed, but the boys were quite relieved to not have to hike the 20km. I was able to get a picture of Mt. Doom before the clouds descended. By the next morning you couldn't see it at all!
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| Mt Doom is the tall one |
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| Mordor |
That evening we pulled out our travel books and made some modifications to our plans. We opted out of the couple days we had planned in Auckland for the Pasifika Festival in favour of some more time in Rotorua and Coromandel. The main reason for the change was to avoid a couple days of driving! I'm glad we did. It's nice to just be in one place for a few days.
So, we went on to Rotorua where we spent a few days. Rotorua, the town, isn't all that great, but there was plenty to do in the area. Bill needed to work, so it was an easy place to keep the boys occupied, plus our Top 10 had 2 hot, geothermal pools and a regular pool.
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| Lady Knox geyser, before she blew her top |
The first full day, we went to Wai-o-tapu, the Geothermal Wonderland. It was fascinating! The ground was quite literally bubbling and steaming everywhere. Anything flamable was charred. A rainbow of colours, each representing a different mineral, filled the water. It was awesome. At one point we stood at the edge of a lake and got lost for several minutes in a cloud of steam. I was a little worried about stumbling into the bubbling water because the boys were goofing around, but we stayed safe, Mom. The Waiotapu park was just a small representation of the whole Taupo/Rotorua area. Even the public park beside our cabin had bubbling mud! The video gives a good impression of what the place was like.
Next up was Hobbiton. Nestled among the rolling pastures of the North Island is this tiny town of Hobbit holes. You cannot see them from any roads, you must take the guided tour (of course). Peter Jackson scouted the location by air. They said he was looking for three things: lovely rolling green hills (which you can find everywhere), a lake (a little more rare), and a massive pine Party Tree. One lucky farmer's sheep paddock met all of the criteria. The Party Tree is now known as the Money Tree -- at $70/tourist, there's no question of why!
A whole team of gardeners tends to Hobbiton each day. The grounds were perfect. Each hobbit hole, and I was surprised by the number of them, is unique, and shows the personality of its resident. I wanted to forage for lunch; the lettuces and other veggies were perfect. It was interesting to learn that the doors were all built to different scales, depending on how up the hill they were. A larger scale meant larger actors could play the role of hobbits, and these were shot from a farther distance.
We were told that Peter Jackson owns half of Hobbiton and the farmer owns the other half. The film company (owned in large part by Jackson, no?) gets a cut too. They were expecting 200 000 tourists this year alone, and more next year after the third Hobbit movie comes out. Thank you, Money Tree. Our guide was a local dairy farmer's son, and he was full of trivia about the movies. For example, when Bilbo and Gandalf are sitting watching the sunset, they are facing east! So, they actually filmed sunrise instead. That scene is also the only one that gives away the location of Hobbiton. Locals recognized the skyline -- as if they didn't know what was going on! Also, even though it was filmed on a sheep farm, Jackson brought in professional sheep because he felt Middle Earth sheep had black faces and legs, not white.
The following evening, after a day spent browsing through town and soaking in the hot pools, we went to the Mitai Maori Village. Since we missed the Pasifika Festival, we felt it was important to get a good sense of the Maori culture. We were picked up at our Top 10 by a tattooed Maori woman in a traditional kiwi feather cape and woven dress. I knew then it was going to be good! Once we arrived, we went into a tent and waited for all of the other tourists to show up. There were about 60 in our group. They led us on a walk through the bush to the Fairy Springs (a cold spring) where we saw their resident eels and trout. It was dark, bubbling volcanic sand under the crystal clear water. Very pretty. Then we went to see our hangi feast as it was brought out of the ground. It smelled really good, and we were really hungry -- but we had to wait! As we continued our walk, we heard the voices of the Maori men and the sound of the conch shells throughout the bush, and caught occasional glimpses of them watching us. Then we lined up along the stream where we watched the Maori men row up and back in their canoe. It was a little intimidating, even though it was all just a show! We were then led to the show tent where we watched a traditional greeting welcoming our tribe (we had a Californian guy as our chief), and a variety of dances, and stories about Maori traditions, tattoos, and so on. I think the video gives a good idea of what it was all about:
Edit: I totally forgot to mention some important parts of the Maori experience! After the show, we went back for our traditional hangi meal. The hangi is cooked underground. The lamb and chicken were very moist and tender. They also cooked potatoes and kumara (sweet potatoes) and stuffing (thanks also to the Pakeha). Pavlova and trifle and chocolate log for dessert. It was quite a feast!
Then, and I can't believe I forgot this, we went for another nighttime walk, this time around the neighbouring Rainbow Springs wildlife park. We had an excellent guide who showed us tuatara (lizards) and kea, fish, native trees, and finally, at long last, KIWIS!! I was super-excited to see them out rooting around in their enclosure. No glass between us! They are nocturnal, so we had to wait until dark. And, they were much larger than I thought -- close to a foot tall, I'd say. I feel really lucky to have seen them!
All in all, it was a fun, memorable, and expensive few days in Rotorua. I don't think our trip would have been complete if we had missed any of it!
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