Today we woke up at another beach spot again, with some beautiful tiny houses on wheels parked next to us. Our luck seems to be gone for today regarding some sunshine. It started to rain again…
Waiotapu thermal wonderland
But luckily for us we’re heading towards Waiotapu thermal wonderland today. This seems to be the best commercial park near Rotorua. Each of all the parks have their own Rockstar. But Waiotapu has its own hall of fame with multiple Rockstar attractions. They have a geyser (which we missed because of the slow parking because of the crowd yes, it is busy here.) they activate it once a day with some shampoo or something? Don’t know exactly because we missed it. Don’t worry too much about it we got another Geyser on our list for today! But the best part they have a pool called Champagne pool. My girlfriend really wanted to see this one. Normally I’m the guy from the colors, but this one was for her! Really liked the colors in the pool. But you have to be lucky to get a good decent shot from it with all the steam.
In the end I can’t be too excited about this park. Yes, it has some beautiful things to show but it will cost you some money. My personal opinion it’s way too expensive to get in for some smelly steam with some boiling things hidden at some places. Even cool names like the Devils home doesn’t solve this.
Mud pools
No, the best part of this area is actually free, and it’s just called simply mud pool. Guess what, it is boiling mud. This one is the main attraction, the leading act from the show. Who doesn’t laugh about the sputtering mud, with some burps flying around, funny sounds the pool creates. Try to catch some flinges from flying mud. But be careful it’s hot!
Hot n Cold hot spring
When your all dirty from the flying flinges off mud, you can go for a nice bath in the hot n cold hot spring. It’s around the corner from the waiotapu carpark/entrance. Not many people here because lots of them love to pay way too much money for the rockstars.
It’s called hot ‘n cold because it has 2 streams coming together. 1 cold and 1 hot off course and they collide into a small swimming hole. Yeah!
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Pohutu geyser
Actually, I was hoping this was going to be the Rockstar of the day. Can this geyser compete with the one I’ve met in Iceland!? We found a nice spot for this one at a surrounding hilltop. You can enter this by a short walk from the MTB Ridgeline Trig Track parking space. From this point you go for a left after the bridge and just follow the path to the trig. You know your right when you walk into a dangerous part from the forest. There are a lot of crocs here so beware!
When you got on top you can choose for two viewing points. One is right at the trig. Or you choose to walk something more downhill after the trig for a real viewing platform. From both positions you can see the Pohutu geyser for free, and you get a stunning view over the Rotorua area. Just simply enjoy, we were there with sunset and it creates some nice colors and shadows over the scenery. But the geyser itself isn’t that spectacular… I’m spoiled by Iceland treasures I’ve seen! Well the best part came for me while walking back to the van. We spotted some glowworms along the way down Nice to see them even hidden in a big forest like this.
Treewalk with lights
After the sunset we went for the tree walk into the redwood forest. And I can’t wait to exploit some things, but this one was the Rockstar of the day! This is a forest which is more than a hundred years old. They created a walkway through the tree tops without harming any trees. Very cool construction I think. The walkway exists about 23 bridges you can all cross. There is also a higher platform along the walkway. But that’s nothing spectacular in the dark. What they did to bring things to life is to teach you some things along the way, and with the night walk everything is lighten up! David Trubridge made all these lights possible. It really is magical (almost as magical as some glowworms we saw earlier tonight) to see everything light up.
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Treewalk images are from their Facebook
After the treewalk we went out to search for a new camping spot. Sleepwell!
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