Exploring the North Island

Both of us with Mount Taranaki in the background

Victoria used to sometimes complain a bit about BC Ferries in Canada, but after this experience, BC Ferries feels like a luxury cruiser. In fact, a suggestion to the operators of the Kiwi ferries would be to go a course in how to load and unload a ferry…. ;) When we went to bed it felt like the bed was still moving and we could still smell the odor of toilet disinfectant that had seemed to linger around the entire ship.

We didn’t spend much time in Wellington and only went for breakfast and a quick drive up to the Victoria lookout before heading off north. Again without much of a plan, but we decided to drive up the West coast.

View over Wellington from Victoria lookout

The scenery was beautiful and we passed several smaller towns and villages that have managed to keep their small town charm without McDonalds or Walmart planted in the middle. It seems as if most of the commerce is still run by ‘mom and pop’ shops with a local butcher, bakery and small stores.

As for fast food, fish & chips and homemade pies is clearly the main staple and it is evident that people take great pride in baking pies as many of the little shops claimed that their pies were ‘the best pies available’. So we decided to stop and try some and picked a small ‘shack’ beside the road in Wanganui. As we weren’t starving we opted for only one piece of fish and a serving of chips each. When our food was ready it was turned out it could have fed a smaller army! Two huge packages wrapped in newspaper filled with fish and chips! All to a cost of $6 each!!! We could easily have shared and gotten full on one of the servings and felt a little bad that we would have to leave quite a lot behind.

Mmmmm.... yummy fish & chips

Robert ate his food in the parking lot of a park and suddenly he was surrounded by curious and hungry ducks waiting for any accidental spillage. It turns out ducks LOVE chips!!! Who knew? Perhaps not the best diet for the birds, but at least we didn’t feel so bad that we couldn’t finish all our food when we got some help to finish it.

The ducks are getting interested in fish & chips...

Robert is getting harrassed by the ducks

We drove a little further up the coast and made a stop for the night in Hawera. We found a wonderful Bed & Breakfast that was hosted in an old renovated house. The standard of B&Bs is very high and often more luxurious (and expensive) than a hotel. The next morning we enjoyed a scrumptious breakfast served by the very nice hostess who told us a bit about the history of the house and how she and her husband had spent four years to renovate it.

Green lush landscape

Our next destination was to go and have a look at the old extinct volcano Mount Taranaki in Egmont National Park. Once we got there a windy road (which by the way, there are plenty of in New Zealand), took us about half the way up the volcano to a viewing area. The weather was nice and the view was absolutely magnificent! We took lots of pictures!

View of the volcano

Victoria and Mount Taranaki

Robert looking cool

Mighty Mountain

Mount Taranaki

That afternoon we continued driving east inland towards Rotorua which is the main town in an area famous for its volcanic activity leading to hot springs, geysers and mud pools. We certainly knew we had arrived when a really pungent smell of sulphur hit us! After visiting some hot springs in Canada we were familiar with the sulphurous smell that usually comes with the springs, but this smell was about five times as strong! We took a look at some of the motels and hotels in the outskirts of town but the smell actually really put us off and one hotel employee told us the smell was particularly bad in this part of town so we decided to drive a little further. We eventually found a very nice little hotel to a reasonable price and where the smell wasn’t too bad.

The next day we set out to explore the volcanic activities and the mud pools that can be seen around town. In the middle of town there is a big park and parts of it is fenced off because of the mud pools which literally are bubbling pools of hot (and smelly) mud! There is also a large aquatic centre which has hot pools (without the mud) and an Olympic sized swimming pool, all heated by the thermal activity. Of course Victoria had to try it out for a swim!

Bubbly hot mud pools...

Victoria and Robert with green lime coloured smelly hot spring

We also went out to Rainbowsprings Wildlife Park in search of some kiwi birds. It’s a small zoo displaying plants and animals of New Zealand and that breeds the rare kiwi bird. Most mammals are introduced to New Zealand and not native and the same is true for a lot of plants and trees. There are, for example, large redwood trees like in Canada, but they have been planted here. Apparently the redwood trees thrive in this climate and make them grow extra fast, but to a cost of poorer quality wood if it were to be harvested. We also saw fish, plants, small mammals and yes, at last, a real kiwi bird! (Not just on a poster...)

Look! It is a...... boy?...girl?...no.....a KIWI!!!!

Kiwi bird on a poster!

Bird bathing

The next day we were up early as we had bought tickets to the Lady Knox geyser which erupts at 10:15am every day. It is located about 30 minutes outside of Rotorua, so we were off to a relatively (for us!!!) early morning. During our drive there we were talking about how amazing it is that they geyser goes off at exactly the same time every day! Strange!

We were very excited to see a geyser as we had hoped to see one in Iceland but didn’t have a chance to. It’s funny that when we were travelling in Canada we had hoped to see the Northern lights but eventually saw them in Iceland, and the geyser we wanted to see in Iceland, we finally would get to see in New Zealand!!

When we got to the viewing area for the geyser, the geyser itself was puffing steam but with no action yet. People were gathering all waiting for it to go off with cameras ready not to miss the big show. At 10:15 everybody was ready but nothing happened…. Then a man that worked in the park came out and starting talking about the history of the geyser and the area we were in. It turned out that there used to be a prison camp not far from there and the prisoners used to come to the hot spring and do their laundry. One day when they had soaked their clothes in water and soap, the geyser erupted and took everybody with a big surprise. It turned out that the soap made the geyser spurt, and from that discovery, they were able to control when the geyser would go off by putting a little soap down the opening of the geyser. Hahaha! So much for the geyser erupting exactly at the same time every day!!!! Of course the park employee had a piece of soap with him, so when his presentation was over, he dropped it into the hole of the geyser, and voila! – the geyser started to bubble, steam and suddenly squirted a high beam of water!!! It was very spectacular and interesting and we took pictures. We only felt a little silly for thinking that nature would have had an internal 24 hour clock so precise that it would go off at exactly the same time every day….not sure if everybody else knew, so we kept it to ourselves in case we were the only fools….

Only some steam coming out so far...

The geyser needed a bit of a helping hand...

It's starting to bubble....

The geyser is going strong!

With the ticket to the geyser we also got access to a large thermal park with hots prings, mud pools and caves formed by volcanic activity. It was an hour walk and quite interesting but in the end it felt like every smelly hot spring looked the same and that the next one was stinkier than the previous…

Bubbly hot spring

Robert checking out if the 'hot' spring is hot. (It was boiling...)

Beautiful colours but very stinky

Soon, we were in the car again and continuing our journey east. Our next destination was Hawke’s Bay which is well known wine region famous especially for their red wines.

written by  Victoria & Robert on March 19, 2010 from Wellington, New Zealand
from the travel blog: The rest of the world
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