Ohhhh boy, this place smells. Pee-you! You get wafts of it, anyway. It’s Rotorua, home of New Zealand’s largest group of geothermal springs, which smell like sulphur from time to time. I haven’t had the luxury of a soak yet, but will have that opportunity tomorrow. People swear by its medicinal properties.
Its pretty cool to think the earth’s magma is close enough to the surface to make the ground water steam. Baby volcanoes making their way to the surface. There are lakes of mud in the area that appear to be boiling, but they are really just belching gas.
I spent last night in a hostel in Coromandel, on a peninsula east of Auckland. A very scenic area amongst some rugged mountains. The drive up and down the peninsula roads was very spectacular, with very windy and twisty switchback turns. Unfortunately, the locals (or visiting weekend yuppies from Auckland) were very impatient and seemed to just want to drag race the whole thing. Some are incredibly rude. I used to get waves from fellow drivers in remote parts of Australia. Now I get the finger from drag racing New Zealanders for not getting out of their way fast enough. I had to keep pulling over to let people pass. It was very frustrating.
That’s my first disappointment with New Zealand. For a country with a population of 4 million, I feel like I’ve already met half of them on the road. I’m hoping there are less people the further south I get.
I have managed to get a few short hikes in on the east / Pacific coast today. One was a ninety minute hike down to a beach known as “Cathedral Cove”, and the other was another hour around Mount Maunganui (which is actually in a city, where it juts out of the harbor). One problem with taking such hikes is the fear of having your car broken into. Travel guides warn you. Signs are posted in parking lots. There is the occasional pile of broken glass on the pavement. You can only hope it doesn’t happen to you. Unfortunately, you can never completely relax while you’re out hiking.
After a splash in the thermal pools of Rotorua tomorrow, I’m planning to aim for Tongariro National Park (smack dab in the middle of the North Island) where there is a famous all-day hike everyone talks about. I’m not sure if it’s the right season for it, but I’m hoping to do it on Monday or Tuesday. After that there is a cool looking volcano named Mount Egmont on the west coast that I hope to check out before visiting Wellington (on the southern end of the North Island) and catching a ferry to the South Island on Thursday (where all the LOTR stuff was filmed). I have found out where the “Piano” beach is, by the way, but have no intention of visiting there. It’s not far from Auckland on the west side — but not on my way.
