Rotorua January 28 - February 1

Maori warrior welcoming us to the hangi.

Kia ora!

On the way to Rotorua we stopped at the Kiwi fruit interpretation centre and took a tour of a typical farm. Ken now knows the history of the Kiwi fruit as well as it’s growth cycle, growing challenges and marketing strategies. He should be a hit at dinner parties when we return home.

Ken, practising his party tricks.

One of the Art Deco features

Our house in Rotorua was built in the 30’s in the art deco style. Wandering about the house is like strolling through a Katherine Mansfield short story. Double glass doors from the dining room open on to a lawn perfect for garden parties.

Dining room with glass doors to the garden.

Nice legs!

We would like to have tea on the garden patio, however, the weather has not been cooperating.During our first night here Cyclone Wilma passed through, dropping 140mm of rain in less than 24 hours leaving flooded streets in its wake.  Ours was one of them. The back garden was under water for all of our first day. We are so fortunate to be in NZ at this historic time - January has had the most rain since they started keeping records some 100 years ago, close to 500mm. On the days when it is sunny, however, it is intense with the UV index reaching 12 or extreme. Ken has a sunburn on his chin, under his beard.

Charles, looking for photo opportunites on our street after the cyclone.

Rotorua in built on the edge of a lake that fills the bottom of a dormant volcano. As a result, the earth’s crust is quite thin here allowing heat from the magma beneath to heat the ground water to temperatures as high as 100°C. Throughout the city there are thermal pools, mineral baths and pools of boiling mud. City parks often have foot baths - covered areas where you can sit and dangle your feet in a natural hot water pool.

Mud pool in the park

Hot pool in the local park.

Sign from the local park

Rotorua is a centre of Maori culture and we have done our best to engage with it. There is a very interesting dynamic at play around Maori culture - one that we are still learning. In this area they have established their influence. Civic functions begin in Maori and then revert to English.

A highlight of our stay was 'Opera in the Pa', a semi-annual evening of opera that brings together some of New Zealand’s opera stars to perform outside at the site of a Maori fortified village or pa. To sit under the southern cross on a beautiful star-lit night watching the sky turn from indigo to black while Aivale Cole and Benjamin Makisi sang was magic.

Benjamin Makisi and Aivale Cole singing at the Opera in the Pa.

 We finished our stay in Rotorua with a walk in the Redwood Forest - Whakarewarewa Forest to the locals. It is a beautiful 40 sq km area adjacent to 3 lakes and crisscrossed by hiking, walking, biking and horseback riding trails. Fran and I hiked for nearly two hours up to a lookout giving us beautiful views down  Lake Rotorua to the city centre. Towering Redwoods and huge ferns surrounded us making it seem like a primordial forest. The insect and bird noise was almost deafening.

Fran hiking through the giant ferns and Redwood trees.

As anticipated it was back to work being a tourist. We did, however, manage to pace ourselves and take time to relax at one of the many local spas.

Relaxing in one of 7 natural hot (43C) pools overlooking Lake Rotorua.

Next, we are off to Tongariro National Park where Ken and Charles plan to hike the Tongariro Crossing.

Climbing Mount Maunganui

From its summit Mount Maunganui commands beautiful 360 degree views of the beach, ocean and harbour.

 So we decided to take a break from the usual....

a beach walk,

Coffee in the morning,

relaxing by the pool,

a glass of wine before dinner

...to climb the mountain. After all, travelling is not all about taking it easy and enjoying life.

After an hour of hard climbing we were rewarded

Needless to say we are enjoying paradise. Beautiful people, beautiful country and beautiful weather.  Friday we move on to Rotorua which is a Maori cultural centre. So it will be back to work being a tourist.

A Quick Update

Mt. Maunganui, New Zealand

Travel blog.....take 2.....

First, and certainly of no importance, all of our electronics seems to have gone mad. We lost our original blog. The internet connection at our condo is so slow we time out before connecting with anything. Fran was using the dictionary function on her Kobo and it suddenly reset to the original factory settings and removed the 5 novels that she had bought before we left. We can re-sync with Kobo, but once again when we have a faster connection. Ken's iPod won’t recharge off the computer. Luckily Linda brought her plug-in charger. I’m thinking it’s the opposite polar magnetic field that is confusing our northern based machines.

So much for petty annoyances. The trip so far has been great. We had bulkhead seats on all of our flights so we had lots of legroom. That was crucial for Fran. She could stand up and stretch at any time so that meant her muscle cramping was kept to a minimum. Hawaii was an amazing 30 hours. We arrived after a very bumpy approach as we traversed a number of thunderstorm cells. We went to bed as soon as we checked in. The next morning it was sunny, blue sky and 80 degrees with soft ocean breezes. We found a restaurant overlooking the beach and had a leisurely 2 hour breakfast. Then we walked for another 2 ½ hours along the beach just breathing it all in. Fran went back to the hotel for a nap.Ken bought a newspaper and sat under a palm tree and read it and daydreamed for another couple of hours. On the way back to the hotel Ken ran into David Suzuki. Then it was back to the airport.

The flight from Honolulu was long, but uneventful in spite of the pilot’s welcome assuring us of smooth air aloft but perhaps a bumpy approach to NZ since a cyclone was tracking towards the north island!!! Luckily it veered away before we landed.

Auckland was our first port-of-call. It is a young, vibrant city the same size as Ottawa - about 1.25 million people. Our hotel was downtown just 2 blocks north of the harbour so we were in the heart of the action. First impressions - it is a city of youth. All of the office workers bustling to work were 30 somethings. Our generation was seen mainly in the service industry - bus drivers, cab drivers, hotel staff. All of the young folks were in suits, with ties!!, or, in the case of the young women, suits with skirts. Smart dress seems to be the norm. The only exception to that is the hundreds of young 20 something travellers. It’s like NZ has become the Europe of the 60’s. There are coffee shops in every block and they are filled with travelers on their laptops, talking on Skype. ( They must have southern hemisphere machines!)

After 2 days in Auckland, Fran and I picked up our car, a 1999 Nissan Sunny, and headed to our first RCI exchange - Mt. Maunganui. After two blue sky days in Auckland, we travelled under a high overcast. It was a lovely drive and we both laughed as we said it was like driving through Middle Earth. We would not have been surprised to see a Hobbit working in the fields.

The GPS is working beautifully. It still blows me away that it can find me all the way down here, (I know that this is what it is designed to do with satellites etc.), but it still seems amazing.

We arrived unpacked and went to do grocery shopping. The supermarkets are identical to the ones at home, right down to the products. All of the international brands are present plus some local ones. The mayonnaise we bought was made in Toronto and the frozen blueberries are from Peterborough. Since it is summer here all of the NZ produce is fresh from the fields. The Gala apples are to die for. I have never had an apple as crisp and tart. The wines, of course, are also abundant.  Oyster Bay has become our house wine here - $10.00 a bottle at the supermarket.

Our condo overlooks the ocean and is very comfortable. Saturday was also overcast. Fran and I took a long beach walk passing the surfers and the beach volleyball tournaments. We came home and I cooked a small roast of lamb for supper. Fresh, never frozen!!

Saturday night it started to rain - hard - very hard and the wind started to blow like I have never seen before. Remember the cyclone that politely moved away as we were flying in? Well, it came back, with a vengence. In Auckland, which thankfully we had left, there was major flooding, buildings damaged, cars flooded. Thinking it was just a summer storm that we were not used to, Fran and I turned out the lights and watched the ocean whipped to a frenzy from the safety of our condo. The next morning we learned what we had experienced. Even the locals were shaken. Charles and Linda arrived late Sunday after a harrowing drive from Auckland. The storm continued unabated for about 24 hours and finally died down in the early hours of this morning. By late afternoon the sun was out, the beach and the pool were full and life where we had anticipated it to be.




We will add pictures to the next posting....assuming that this blog doesn't disappear!!