Having had such a good time at hot water beach we were in search of some more thermal activity, of the volcanic type or something near to it which made our destination Rotorua. On the way we were making at stop at a place called Waitomo caves which is a place famous in New Zealand for its glow worm caves. After a long and pretty average drive we arrived at Waitomo caves to discover that this natural wonder had been turned into a money spinner in a big way. The options of seeing the individual caves were very pricey, but as we had gone out of our way to get here we chose what we thought would be best and went on our guided tour. The tour went through the cave down to the river under it detailing the stalagtights and stalagmites, before boarding the small wooden boat in the dark tunnel. Our tour was to be a 45 minute one so should now give us around 15 minutes in the cave, the blue colour of the glow worms appeared covering the whole ceiling of the cave. The light from the worms although very distinct in colour did not create much light to aid vision, which was odd as there were so many and so bright but not if that makes sense. This trip however did not last the time we expected and we were out of the other end and at the drop of point, the fact that it takes several minutes to walk back to the start point is the remainder of the tour as the operator see it. As this is just a path around the outer of the cave with nothing but a normal wood we don’t agree and were less than impressed with this idea, however we have to remember that the glow worms themselves were still worth seeing in their natural glory.

EGGS, EGGS, Rotting eggs was the distinct smell indicating we were at Rotorua, otherwise known as sulphur pouring out from the ground of this still active volcanic area. All around the town are geyser and bubbling mud and hot pools of various forms, all giving of this distinct smell. After some research we again discovered that the greed had taken over and the majority of these natural wonders had been fenced in, with the addition of some meaningless shop/so called cultural centre which had no real relation to the thermal stuff a high charge was put on entering these places. As we had looked at several options we decided that the best option was to view the city park which had areas of mood pools and hot pools all steaming away, but with no charge as it was a city park and natural as were the rest. This would be followed by a trip to a thermal park on the way south which was a little cheaper and seemed to have more to do with the thermal/volcanic stuff we wanted to see.

The city park was quite good but odd that such an active area had been used as a recreational area, especially as the areas last eruption was 2003 leaving a fair few trees covered from ash and mild lava. Combined with this an area had just been fenced off not properly but with the high vis stuff, as the ground caved into a new bubbling mud pool. We spent a couple of nights in the area checking out the city and getting updated with banking, blogs etc before heading off for the thermal park and onward south.
The thermal park was called Wai-O-Tapu and covered a fair stretch of land that would entail a good 2- 3 hour tour, its mud pools were much bigger than we had seen and a lot more aggressive. We had made sure we were in time for the geyser eruption at 10:15, which was a worthwhile viewing, the eruption of water reaches 20-30 metres and lasts for upto 1 hour. Following on from the geyser is the walk around the park, taking in highly colourful pools, lakes, and again various steaming holes or hot pools of various shapes and sizes as you will see. The smell here was again not so pleasant and many people were struggling to not see their breakfast in an unpleasant format while walking around the park. The whole thing was something we were glad to have done as we learnt a fair bit, but mainly because these things are so unusual to see. With our aim to see the thermal stuff active it was pack up and off again heading this time for?