Tourist not a Terrorist

Accents are a funny thing. With traveling a lot I don’t notice accents that much any more but according to NZ people my accent is pretty strong (ask my family and they will disagree) When I told someone that we were going to Rotorua to be a Tourist for the day they looked really shocked because they thought that I said I was going to be a terrorist.

Anyway. Off we headed to a place called Rotorua for the day. Myself, Rachael, Roy and Sam.

We had 3 things that we wanted to accomplish during our trip away and they were a trip to a Thermal Village, go up the Gondola and do the Luge and finally make a trip to the Polynesian Spa.

Thermal Village www.whakarewarewa.com

This was incredible to visit. It is a little community of Maori people who bring people into their town for tours and show you a little of the history of Maori people. They started off with a traditional dance, sang songs, performed the Haka and then took us on a tour of the natural thermal pools. These pools are almost hard to believe that they are natural. They are pools that are fed straight from the ground at crazy hot temperatures. The first pool they showed us was where they cooked their food. At the top of this pool it was between 85 and 93 degrees and at the bottom of the pool it can get up to 145 degrees. I was rather impressed with this until they took us to the next pool. This pool was smaller than the first yet it had bubbles coming to the surface of it. The top of this pool was 178 degrees (now that is warm). This village was a great trip, it smelt really bad because of the thermal pools. Almost like a nasty egg fart with a hint of gross. We had our traditional Hangi lunch (Hangi is a special way of cooking food under the ground using red hot rocks and steam.)

Gondola & Luge www.skylineskyrides.co.nz/rotorua/ssr_luge

Off to the Gondola we went. Up into the mountain side where we got our luges and shot down the track to the bottom where we got on another gondola and repeated the luge process another 4 times. The luge is kind of like a bobsleigh, without the ice and you don’t have to wear spandex (which I was a little disappointed in)

This was fun and a great way to bang into really slow people on the track. We discovered quite a violent streak in Rachael as she tried many times to push us over the edge.

From here we decided that we wanted to relax so we headed to the Polynesian Spa. Was this nice or what!! ! (No need to answer because it was)

Polynesian Spa www.polynesianspa.co.nz
We decided that we would pay the extra dollars to get the pools that the kids were not allowed in and what a great decision this was. These pools are outdoors and the air temperature was a little chilly so when we jumped in the first natural hot pool it was 38 degrees and very warm. You might not know (or even care) but I love baths so for me this was heaven, apart from the fact that I couldn’t properly lie back and that I was sharing it with 20 others, and i had shorts on… but the heat was nice. The pool got a little crowded so we decided to head to the pools that overlooked the sea. There were 3 different pools you could choose from but we went to the hottest one (of course). The pools were 39 degrees, 41degrees and 42 degrees and I found it fascinating that these were naturally hot pools. The water was sooo warm. The best thing to do was to get into a position that was comfortable and stay there. Do not move, do not breath to heavily as it could move the water around you and that water around you was hot. Occasionally we would jump out and go to the shower that they had. This was fun because it was a cold shower. The not so fun thing was that it was unclear the first time as to where the water jets would come out. You push the button and the shower hits you from all angles. There is no whimping out and only getting an arm wet. It is all or nothing. Then you jump back in the pool and feel your skin sizzle.

We stayed in there for ages but we decided to leave for two reasons, 1 being that we were getting a little light headed from the heat and second a bus load of Koreans arrived and they must have been tricked into thinking that it was cool to wear the tightest black spandex short shorts they could find and most of them decided that our pool was the best. We left.

We jumped back in to the 38 degree pool to finish off with and it was a little disappointing. The first time we jumped in it was very warm, now it wasn’t as warm, so I sat out and let my body cool down and then jumped back in.

It was a great day and I was very tired when I got home (wow I sound like my mum). I think you wouldn’t want to be a terrorist in Rotorura cause being a Tourist was way more fun.