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It was once again grey and damp on our journey into Taupo. We have been pretty lucky with the weather so far on our trip so it was bound to turn wet at some point, New Zealand is clearly the chosen country.
Before we headed into Taupo we stopped off a Huka Falls, a fast flowing river / waterfall. The river itself flows so quickly that 'you' are not allowed to use it for commerical rafting, you can't charge people to go down it. It was impresive to see how quick the water was, with the majoirty of it white in colour, thanks to the strong current.
Once in Taupo we did what we normally do and checked into our hostel, although with 50 odd people checking in off the Kiwi bus there was a problem with the key cards to the rooms so we had to wait around for a good couple of hours before we could fully check in. We were once again staying at a BASE hostel (which we had pre - booked and paid $21 instead of the $29 they were charging everyone else off the bus who just 'turned up') which we would have prefered not to stay in but it was the cheapest in town so we went for it. It is a fairly new hostel so everything is pretty well equiped and still fairly new, which was nice. We checked into our 4 bed dorm (with an ensuite) before going for a quick walk as there was a break in the rain. This didn't last for long though so we headed back.
Taupo itself is a medium size town right on Lake Taupo, which is pretty stunning. The lake is surrounded by hills, woodland and mountains in the distance. On our first day though most of this was hiding under a blanket of cloud / fog - it was like Lake Rotorua all over again. This time though we had booked four nights, hopefully enough time for the sun to find it's hat.
We had two other girls in our dorm, both from the Kiwi bus and that night got know them and went for a few drinks.
Feeling suprisingly fresh the next day we were ready to go and explore on our first full day, but this plan went our the window when we saw the weather, more rain. The highlights of our day were some luandry and going to the supermarket to get some food in for our stay. Thats is honestly about all we did. We did however find out that staying in a BASE hostel on the 1st floor is not the best idea.
All BASE's have a bar on site, underneath the hostel, therefore we were only one floor above it. The music which starts to get really loud about 10pm, ("all the way through to 3am") didn't make for the best nights sleep, the bass from the speakers also vibrated the walls in our room. Even with the trusty ear plugs all the way from Coffs Harbour, the sound of the music was only muffled.
Day three, weather update - drizzle and cloud. I feel like a weather man writing these blogs. After some breakfast the drizzle was more on and off and we seized the oppotunity to get out, we couldn't take another day couped up in the hostel.
As we were right on Lake Taupo we decided it would be fitting to go for a stroll around its edge. Not the entire lake though as the thing is bloody massive so we chose a direction (left or right) and went for it, left we went. We strolled along the shore of the lake away from the town. The rain was still on and off but the views over the lake were still quite good, looking over the lake to the surrounding grassy hills, the mountains in the distance were still hard to make out, although they did show there face at one point. After walking for a good hour or so we started to make the return journey back for some lunch.
One thing that we were told about and we had spotted on the first day was "The Great Lake Hole in One Challenge" and I couldn't resist a go. Basically as the name suggests you have to get a hole in one, on a small island about 100 odd metres out in the lake. If you manage a hole in one you win $10,000 - as the lottery used to say "It could be you" (by 'you' I mean us). Unfortuantley, 20 balls later we were no richer and had to sadly walk away, it was good fun though, just smashing the balls into the lake was fun enough so it would have been a bonus to win the money.
We had planned to nothing for the rest of the evening but we some how managed to forget how loud the music was. At about 11 o'clock we went by the old moto of 'if you can't beat them, join them' and went out for a couple of drinks. Not to the bar downstairs though but a more chilled out pub across the street. It was nice to have a couple of drinks and chill out but it would also help us sleep, two birds with one stone.
The following morning and after a better nights sleep it was our last day in Taupo. To complete the four days of pretty poor weather we woke up to yet more rain. Although this didn't last all day and alternated between rain and some sun. Therefore we made the most of the bad weather and did some serious catching up on the blog, handy for a rainy day. The rain did stop for long enough in the late afternoon and we headed out for another walk. This time we turned right, towards a small harbour and some expensive looking houses. The walk didn't last as long as the previous one though as the path stopped at the harbour, leaving only the built up area's to walk round, which didn't really appeal. A brief stop at the supermarket for a packed lunch the following day and thats how we spent our last day in Taupo.
You wouldn't have guessed it but Taupo is a stop in New Zealand which is know for a number of extreme activities, such as sky diving. Now you can clearly see that we participated in none of the extremeness but tried to make the most of the surrounding area, kind of hard with all the rain though. It was four days of less than we probably planned but Taupo is a nice place and great location so there are definitely worse places to spend four rainy (ish) days.
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