Rotorua is the Maori Capital of New Zealand
Not too early a start today. The coach picked us up at 9.00am to take us out to Agrodome. This is a tourist attraction that shows the varieties of sheep that are farmed in New Zealand. The presenter of the show was “full of Kiwi humour” as Nellie our tour leader said. There were 17 different rams on show and each had different characteristics, from the beautiful wool of the Merino to the lovely sweet tasting meat of the Dorset Down. The ram with the biggest horns was the Dorset Horn and there was also the Poll Dorset which has been bred from the Dorset Horn but without the dangerous horns. The presenter demonstrated the art of sheep shearing and also had youngsters on stage to try to milk a cow. He also had his working sheep dogs on stage to demonstrate the way that they would jump on the sheep’s backs to make them go where the drover wanted them to go.
From Agrodome we drove out to Te Puia which is a Geo-thermal and Maori cultural park. Rotorua is in the crater of a volcano and the crust of the earth is at its thinnest in this area. We saw natural geysers, mud pools and steaming fumaroles.
A fascinating Maori Guide, called Faith, took us around. Her mother was a guide in the 1970’s and Faith had inherited her job; she did not have to apply for it! We saw traditional buildings with carved fascias, the Maori wood carving school and also the weaving school, where people learn to process and weave the Flax. Faith took us into a dark building where we saw a real kiwi. No photos were allowed so we had to make do with a stuffed one in the foyer of the centre!
Back to the hotel for a coffee stop and the chance to write some blog before heading out for our free afternoon/evening around the beautiful lake and township. We walked about 5km seeing sulphur beds and pools, steaming fumaroles, more interesting birds, remarkable trees and a large butterfly that landed on a Maori fence.
Many of the local houses take advantage of the geothermal conditions and have sunk boreholes in their gardens to tap into the hot water; you can see steam emitting at all times of day. If you don’t like your neighbours here, you can always move house as you may see from this photo of a house strapped to a low-loader ready for a midnight flit. The services below had just been chopped off and the water mains were spurting.
It takes Moving House to a new level!
Linda is currently making use of the laundry facilities before we go back into town for a meal.
We had a lovely Thai meal at the Rice Bowl. Sitting outside at 9.30pm in February can be recommended. (Sorry to make you jealous!!!) Unfortunately we didn’t take the camera as Ian’s meal was seriously flambéed at the table.
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