ROTORUA - Hangis and Hongis

Rotorua is the geo-thermal hotspot of New Zealand. The crust of the earth is so thin here that the holes and vents that are dotted around parks, back gardens and on street corners hiss with steam, simmer with scalding water and are filled with bubbling mud that boils with a plop and a wallop. Mighty geysers erupt like clockwork in the thermal parks around the town and a dip in the balmy waters of Kerosine Creek, deep in the bush, is heavenly. It all makes for an extraordinary landscape. Steam rises from the forests and bush on the approach to town then you are overwhelmed by what makes Rotorua unique – the nose-screwing pong of rotten eggs which makes you wonder if you can even open the car door let alone stay here for a week. Oddly enough, you get used to the sulphuric bouquet very quickly and after a few minutes it’s no longer an issue unless you happen to be in a particularly pungent part of town. Europeans first came here in the 1880’s to take the waters and some very weird and wonderful therapies which are still popular today but without the electrodes.

Tarawera

We had been invited to stay with the Townsends at Lake Tarawera. There is dad Dave, mum Carol, Finlay and Tessa and Reggie the crazy little dog who runs his own single-handed possum eradication scheme and proudly leaves his trophies on the front lawn, barking until sufficient praise has been bestowed. Tarawera is a few miles out of Rotorua and over supper on the first night Dave told us that there was a car in the garage at our disposal for the week. He added that is wasn’t much but it was reliable and would get us around. It was waiting outside for us the following morning and it took all day for the big grin to fade from Marc’s face. We spent the week riding around in a bright blue sports car and although it was autumn with crisp mornings and a chill in the air, we had to go everywhere with the top down – my woolly hat pulled down over my ears to my eyes and a scarf up over my nose with the heater blasting hot air to my feet. It was great fun.

Lake Tarawera has to be amongst the most idyllic of places to live. The sparse settlement, glowing in autumn colour, runs along the edge of the lake under the shadow of Mount Tarawera which blew its top in a massive volcanic eruption in 1886 that buried an entire village and destroyed the Eighth Wonder of the Natural World – the dazzling Pink and White Terraces of silica on which people would come from far and wide to bathe (ladies and gentlemen segregated of course), leaving nothing but a deep crater. The disaster had been foretold a few days earlier by the sighting of a ghost war canoe silently crossing the misty early morning waters of Tarawera. Tourists and Maori guides on the lake on the way to view the terraces sighted the craft’s double row of occupants, one row paddling and the other standing wrapped in flax robes, their hair plumed as for death with the feathers of the huia and white heron. To the terrified Maoris these were the souls of the departed being ferried to the mountain of the dead and an omen of disaster, dire and inevitable.

Thankfully, there were no apparitions on the water the night we went out. We had a fantastic evening on the lake with all five Townsends and a couple with a lovely Valleys lilt who had emigrated from Ynysybwl. We boarded the boat at sunset and enjoyed a bottle or three in the cabin on big white sofas as we crossed the lake to Hot Water Beach. We stripped down to our togs and went ashore where Finlay sat a large saucepan filled with frankfurters in a scalding hot stream running into the lake. Back onto the boat and around the corner to soak in a hot rock pool on the lake edge. The perfect spa-like hollow can easily sit six bathing in moonlit bliss but the person nearest the ‘hot tap’ has to be careful not to get too close and end up poached. Soak over and peckish, we got back on the boat and returned to the steaming pan and dined on hotdogs and beer – the perfect evening.

Mud, Mud, Glorious Mud

After spending a morning following very clearly marked paths through the steaming, blistering landscape of Hells Gate Thermal Reserve we treated ourselves to a mud spa. The attendant led us behind a bamboo screen to a small private pool and we stepped down into waist high hot murky water. At the bottom of the pool was a six inch layer of the softest and silkiest mud which we had great fun throwing and slapping on each other. Within two minutes we were covered and calling the attendant who must have know beforehand what was coming as he is probably asked to take dozens of photos every day. After the prescribed half an hour came the shock of the cold shower before a medicinal soak in an even hotter sulphur pool and a final warm shower to wash off the ingrained mud. I felt so relaxed and floppy and my skin was as smooth and soft as a baby’s …

Te Puia

Te Puia is home to the NZ Maori Institute of Arts and Crafts and also boasts the fantastic Whakarewarewa thermal reserve. What was intended to be a short visit turned out to be an all-dayer and once again, our car was the last in the carpark. The day started with a walk around the park to see the geysers. Pohotu Geyser erupts every couple of hours, shooting water tens of metres into the sky and obliterating the sun with clouds of steam. A sign that Pohutu is about to blow is the smaller Price of Wales Feathers geyser nearby going for it twenty minutes earlier. Our guide informed us that the eruption lasts about 10 minutes but a few years ago it blew continually for 215 days! We were then led from bright sunlight into a pitch black building, feeling our way along a railing in front of a big gloomy enclosure. As our eyes adjusted, mine grew wider and wider as I recognised what was snuffling and poking around in the undergrowth right in front of me – it was a kiwi, and it was huge! At last! We stayed for about half an hour watching her forage about then we had to leave for the afternoon concert which was to take place in the whare (meeting house). We all assembled at the gate and appointed a leader who went forward to accept the leaf of friendship offered by the Maori in traditional dress and brandishing a spear in the traditional friend or foe ceremony. After a lot of tongue poking and eye rolling, they greeted each other with a hongi - the pressing of noses and sharing of a breath and we followed our leader into the beautifully carved building. The concert was wonderful – lots of singing, traditional poi and stick dancing and of course, the haka, which makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up every time I see it. We had a hangi lunch, which is the traditional way of cooking here. A hole is dug in the ground and meat and vegetables are wrapped in large leaves and placed on top of white-hot stones lining the bottom of the pit. The food parcels are covered in cloth then the earth is replaced on the top and in a few hours the whole thing is dug up. Baskets made of flax are also filled with vegetables and dropped into boiling springs to cook. Everything is so tasty and bursting with flavour.

Like the pictures of a book, arts and crafts are the pages of Maori culture. It’s how their stories were told and passed down through generations and how traditions and ancestry were preserved. History was carved and woven and these skills are taught and kept alive at Te Puia. Every year the Carving School takes a dozen students from different tribes to learn under the watchful eye of masters for three years and at the Weaving School, Maori young and old are taught hands on in a centuries old craft. It was awesome to watch their deft and skilful hands at work. A Maori called Mick with a fantastic moko on his chin invited us to have a go at carving a simple design into a piece of totara wood using a mallet and chisel. A long time ago, I had the third best exam mark in the whole of my class for woodwork and fancied my chances of turning out something beautiful but alas my skills had somewhat diminished and giving the finished article a coat of varnish was like trying to make a proverbial silk purse.

White Water Rafting

Marc sprayed on a wetsuit again at Rotorua for a morning of white water rafting on the Kaituna River – this was Grade 5 stuff with the first waterfall being a eight metre drop. My plan was to see them off, have a frothy coffee in the village then stroll back to the huge shed that was base to wait for them to return. The ‘dry training run’ was hilarious to watch. Fully kitted out with lifejackets, helmets and oars, the six paddlers took their place in the raft which sat in the middle of the car park and practised jumping into position and gripping anchor points for hands and feet for when the going got rough and crossing over to the opposite side of the raft in lightning speed on cue from the man barking orders at the back. Marc sat at the pointy end on the right-hand side, or should that be at the bow on the starboard side.

The run was to be captured on camera and just as the lads lifted the raft onto the back of the trailer and my thoughts turned to cappuccino, the photographer, a short man as wide as he was tall, asked if I’d like to come along so I accepted, thanked him and started to move towards the van. Instead, he directed me up a lane then down a marked track for a couple of kilometres to the river where he’d be waiting on a viewing platform after dropping the rafters off. Off I shot and got to the first viewing point well in time where I could hear him puffing and wheezing his way down the path from the road. We were high above a huge pool right opposite the thundering eight metre cascade and couple of minutes later I heard shouts and whoops through the trees then the pilot canoe appeared and shot over the falls followed by the raft. All was well until about half way down when I saw two falling out of the boat as the whole thing disappeared into the raging depths, one from the bow on the starboard side … He bobbed up quickly in the shallows and was instantly hoiked out the water still whooping and off they went again, hotly pursued along the bank by me and the photographer. Our pace quickly dropped off and I was afraid that I was about to witness some sort of cardiac incident but thankfully we arrived at the second waterfall intact and in time to capture them yell and plunge over the edge. I was relieved to hear that the photographer was making his way to the next viewpoint in the van. I was directed down the track for another few kilometres so off I darted again, keen to get there in time. I jogged along, camera in hand, checking my pocket for the spare battery, feeling just like the paparazzi. The river meanders its way back and forwards through the trees here and I could hear the raft or rather the rafters making their way down to the last big buzz. I waited on the landing ramp as the raft made its way down the rapids then it turned around at the bottom and everyone took it in turn to sit at the front and have a good dunking as the raft was paddled forward and forced down into the waves. Then it was all over and the sight of the lads carrying the raft aloft looked like a big twelve-legged insect emerging from the bush. It had been a fabulous morning and I don’t know who was more sorry to see it all come to an end – me or the six in the boat.

There are another hundred and one other things at Rotorua that I could tell you about like the Duckboat bus tour that made me laugh everytime I heard it quack by; careering down the side of a mountain on a 3-wheel cart and jumping on the cable car to go back up for yet another go; the world-famous sheep show in the Agrodome; the brilliant museum and the video of the volcano complete with quaking seats and lovely walks around the lake at sunset to name but a few. There are also another hundred and one things that we didn't get round to - this time ...