Day 5

Rotorua

We had to get up early the next morning to get Steven to a pick up point for his slegding/rafting day. We drove the 8km back to town to wait at the outdoorsmans shop. The kids and I grabbed a coffee and a cocoa and kissed him goodbye as he jumped in a surfer van filled with 20 year olds.

While dad was gone, Ally, Austin and I headed over to the Whakarewarewa thermal reserve. The hardest part was driving the big campervan without a co-pilot. Trying to back out of a busy parking spot, I stalled three times and cut off an angry local. The reserve wasn’t that far away – thank goodness. Whakarewarewa is a Maori village settlement, where Maori still live today. 10 years ago the women came up with the idea of charging tourist for tours. It was having a special anniversary. The place was packed with locals. The Maori remind me a lot of American Indians, still struggling to find a successful way in a world where their traditions now mean less. We started with a guided tour. Austin was miserable. He was afraid of the steam and thermal holes, afraid of the large, scary looking Maori people and missing Dad. Ally had no desire to walk anywhere.

We watched how they steam their food in the vents everyday, and take a communal thermal bath every evening. (we didn’t watch the actual bathing!) After the tour we watched a song and dance show, with poi balls and Haka moves. On the way out we got a boxed hangi lunch, which is steamed chicken, veggies, stuffing and bread all cooked on the volcanic steam vents. Ally ate, but Austin was too afraid, refusing in case of poison. After seeing a real tattoo artist doing tattoos on site, Austin became a whimpering pain. I think the boy needs an older brother-- Stat. So we left the reserve and headed to the north part of the lake to try to catch a view of dad.

It was sheer luck that we pulled in to the Okere waterfall reserve park and heard voices of rafters going by. So we rushed to the first waterfall viewpoint just in time to see dad going over a large waterfall in a rubber raft! I was taking pictures before I even knew it was Steven. In the excitement, Austin hit my camera case and sent it and the batteries and memory card flying over the edge. Thank goodness the camera was in my hands. I spent a few minutes figuring out how to climb down a gorge when I decided it just was too hard. By then we could hear what sounded like Maori chants, so we decided to run further down the trail to find out where the sounds where coming from. After a 10 minute jog, we came to another viewpoint for yet another waterfall and there were the rafters heading down again. This time we were able to ID Steven and give a big wave! Our timing was miraculous.

We drove back down to Hell’s Gate to pick up Dad. The rafting place is next door to a thermal reserve and mud bath. We headed over to do a mud bath, but it was really expensive and thought it might be nicer just to relax in the holiday park for a couple of hours. The one thing I didn’t plan for well was just how fun the campervan holiday parks are. They have playgrounds, trampolines and more and are usually in really scenic settings. So we went back to swing, jump and explore. Austin and I rented a funky buggy bike, while Dad and Ally played at the lakeside park. If it weren’t windy, we would have been swimming. The lake was warm, but the wind was so strong and cool that you’d have to stay submerged to enjoy it.

After a recharge we headed back out to go to the Luge and have dinner. You ride up a large gondola to a scenic hilltop. From there you can choose one of 3 routes down: Scenic, intermediate and advance. I thought the scenic was white knuckle enough, but the kids and dad wanted more. After a couple of runs, we had a buffet dinner at the top. While the food had been rated high online and in books, we felt you were really paying for the view. Of course, the dessert bar wasn’t that bad!