So leaving Whitiange/Mercury Bay we got on a bus to Rotorua! On the way we stopped at Matamata where Hobbiton is! Miranda, Sem and me couldnt not go and check out the film set so we left the Kiwi bus and got taken to Hobbiton where we walked around the set!! As they are due to start filming the Hobbit in the next couple of weeks we had to sign confidentiality forms not to put any pics up on the internet/facebook/youtube/etc. so you wont be seeing them unless i email or you come round to my house wen im home and i show you! The place itself is in the most amazing/beautiful location with big rolling hills! really gorgeous! I know its a place for small people to live but the whole place felt a lot smaller than i thought it would be! but it was really weird/cool to be walking around! really want to watch the films again just to see it and be like "oh hey! i was there!!" haha so good!

As the location is still a part of a working farm they also took us to watch them shearing sheep (which apparently is a very popular sport here in NZ - if sheep shearing is a sport then cheerleading definitely is!!). We also got to feed 6week old lambs, very cute they were! The only really bad thing about the trip the shire was that we had to wait AGES to get a shuttle bus to rotorua where we were staying for the night!

This evening we went to a Traditional maori Cultural evening. So we got packed up on our bus and the guy taking us there was amazing!!! he introduced us all to the trip in 61(!!!!) different languages!! mental! Sem got chosen as our bus chief ?(HA HA HA) he then got chosen to go and receive the gift the maori people offer to see if we are friends or foe. Pretty funny to watch! Their traditional homes are really cool wooden structures and hidden in the forest, really really nice and we got to watch some of their traditional games and wood carving and just meet the people! Following some traditional dances and singing we went for dinner where the food had been cooked in an underground oven heated by hot stones and buried! BEST FOOD so far of the trip! sooo good, was chicken and lamb and loads of veg followed by some yummy pavlova. had a massive food baby afterwards! After we had the same man take us back in the bus where he started singing all teh national anthems! AMAZING haha adn then went driving round and round and round and round a roundabout (ew dizzzzzzy) but was quite a laugh! After a quick drink in the bar people headed off to bed but me and sem ended up wandering round the park across the road to check out the hot springs/pool/bubbling mud pits... wotever they were! but they STANK soooooo bad!! rank as!

In the morning we were due to lose Sem and then his rafting got cancelled so he jumped back on our bus (woo) haha. We were headed to Waitomo today! On the way we had a few options and soem people went zorbing but me char and holly went to Agroventures and went on the swoop! which is a 40m bungy where the 3 of us are in sacks/cocoons we then get pulled up on the bungy and i hd to pull the cord and we dropped and then swung forward! Definitely wasnt expecting to just fall vertically which frightened the living daylights out of meeeee!! it was sooooooo much fun tho! my legs were properly shaking tho!

When we got to waitomo we booked onto black water rafting. I chose the black labyrinth (3 hr trip). you could choose a 5 hr one which did abseiling and climbing a waterfall but was really expensive and turns out 3 hrs was perfect i thought! So we got suited and booted in smelly two-piece wetsuits and white wellies and headed off to the caves, before we went in we had to practice jumping backwards into the water with our rings, i went first. haha the water went straight up my nose.. and quickly back out again AHAHA grosssss! was pretty funny tho. We walked to a tiny opening in the side of the mountain where a stream was running in and climbed through the cave to find an opening where we sat and had a safety briefing etc. Our guide also pointed out these massive spider things (cant remember their actual name) absolutely cacked myself, they were HUGE :S dislike!! We then continued to walk through the cave network which ranged in water depth from shins to waist (altho im jst small so it was high on me). The water was really strong at points and definitely couldnt stop at one point so the guide had to grab me and pick me up hahaha how silly. We jumped backwards a couple of times of small waterfalls and drifted along. For part of it we all joined together and floated in the pitch black and saw hundreds and hundreds of glow worms! it was magical!! if you had beent he first person to discover the place you would have thought it was magic! soo beautiful! didnt want it to end apart from the fact it was FREEZING! our guide gave us these awesome chocolate marshmallow fish aswell! sooo yummy!

In the evening weactually cooked dinner for the first time... well sem really ended up cooking but we watched/washed up or whatnot! haha It was really yummy pasta and stuf tho! We then headed to Curlys Bar which we had heard good things about altho turns out was just like a pub really! not that busy but played pool for agesssss, couldnt keep my eyes open by the end so left everyone to it and went to bed! think was one of the best nights sleep i'd had on the trip!