I arrived past midnight in Auckland, and then woke up nice and early the next day to grab a coach down to Rotorua. I had this big smile on my face, the sun was pouring through the windows and I was sun bathing in the rays and cruising along taking in the greenness of the sights…. and slumped exhausted across two seats. Sort of tired from everything.. you know?

New Zealand is known by the Maori (local people) as the land of the long white cloud and there was not a cloud to be seen the entire time. There’s a pervading smell of bad eggs in Rotorua – it’s actually the sulphur from all the bubbling pools, mud and geothermal activity in the area. It’s everywhere, steam, bubbling mud, and hot ground and streams (sulphur smelling) trickling into the lake. I was super lucky (again) when I picked up my rental car, not only did the lovely lady let me take it early, I got a VW Polo (Golf) – it’s got a pretty decent engine for a small car. Her husband was telling me, “It’s got treptronic” “What?”"Triptronic”   Basically it means the car can be shifted from auto to sports (manual mode). It’s a nifty piece of technology, which sadly I didn’t test out, but Rototrua has some great windy and smooth roads for driving. So happy..

Kitted out in a great car, weather was sunny, went for a Maori Cultural evening and dinner where I feasted on the most delicious and fresh seafood (oysters! mussels! prawns!), chicken, pork, lamb, bread, sweet potato cooked in volcanic steam, buffet salad, desert, soup…possibly the best seafood chowder I have ever had, finishing off the night watching geysers in the night with a cup of hot chocolate. I was happy. Full of food and super happy. Haka was good too, you may have seen it from Rugby. The Rugby World Cup is in Auckland in 2 weeks, all of Auckland is going mad for it – here’s the Haka

The next morning, the weather was still perfect to walk in the redwood forest – I found it amazing with blue (because of the volcanic silica in the water) lakes and huge redwood trees. Hopped in the car to find the “Hidden Valley” , which is this place where the BBC filmed some shots from “Walking with the dinosaurs” – it might not have lived up  to the hype (after building it up in my head) and the main publicity shot was actually taken from a geothermic cave pool where we weren’t allowed to go into. The pool was also a lot smaller than they made it look… so I hopped over the barrier and took a look. All I can say is that the pool is nice, with very clear warm water. I know this because the water is so clear I put one foot into it. There are signs everywhere not to wander off the path, there are a lot of bubbling pools, heat and sulphur. Definitely not something you’d see everywhere.

Rotorua is gorgeous, there’s just this violent volcanic feeling about it, the oversized forests, the Maori culture, yet gentle with the green rolling hills and the friendly people and the honey. New Zealand honey is DELICIOUS by the way. I fully regretted not having check in luggage. I am going to hunt down Kiwi honey now, it was so… just… amazing. Just amazing honey. I am still thinking about that honey ice cream.

Back in Auckland that evening, I was surprised by a Taiwanese Night Market in the Town Square, lots of food stalls and yum Chinese food, games, drinks. The next day I was off to Rangitoto, an island off Auckland, which was, you guessed it, formed by a volcanic eruption. It was a really quick trip overall, I didn’t get to go to the volcanic spa in Rotorua because I ran out of time, I didn’t get to go to Queenstown either (which apparently got 15 inches of snow the week before). But I love New Zealand, will definitely be back for more!

Hope all’s well where you are,

Shi.