Rorotua

A peaceful night. We were alone on the restaurant car park once all the staff had left. This wasn't very late as the restaurant did not seem to be open in the evening – just as well we ate in the 'van! We had a walk round some of the olive trees, there seemed to be hundreds of them up the valley sides around the site of the restaurant. There were none to pick as the season is not yet – mind you we couldn't tell you when it will be as we know little about the growing requirements of olives and even less about growing them in New Zealand.

We left just after 9.30, on our way down to Rotorua which is our next stop. It is a volcanic area and we will be stopping at a site which has its own heated pools, from the volcanic hot water.

The journey was much easier and quicker than yesterday. We stopped at Countdown, another supermarket in the Woolworths chain, and restocked our larder (actually Bert only had beer and wine on his list) and bought the NZ sunday paper. The headline read “Heroes of the Flood” and there were a lot of stories about people being rescued from their homes, livestock being recovered from the floodwaters and so on. And the cause of all this devastation – Cyclone Wilma. A name that will not be forgotten in New Zealand for a while.

We stopped for our lunch at a lovely little town called Cambridge. (Not bad is it, Bombay and Cambridge in the same day.) It reminded us a little bit of Cannon Beach in Oregon, lots of eating houses and the place was packed with cars on the street but, just as in Cannon Beach, the car park behind the shops was almost empty. We had a very good lunch and then had a quick stroll up the main street looking at some of the old buildings before returning to the 'van for the rest of the journey.

Rotorua is sited to one side of the lake of the same name. The rainfall of the last few days means that it is very high. We walked along to St Faith's Church, which looked most interesting architecturally and which sits on the edge of the lake and looked over the amazing waters. 

Everywhere you walk you see clouds of steam either coming directly out of the ground or up through man-made vents. Just at the side of the holiday park, called Cosy Cottage International (although we think the Cottage has been demolished!) there is a pool and you can watch the water boiling! The pools on the site that are available to bathe in are at a very pleasant temperature and everywhere you go the hotels and motels are advertising 'hot pools'. Just along the road from where we are staying you can find Red Rock Thermal Hotel, a bit more romantic than a thermal vest!

The campsite even has a “steam oven”; a thermal hole surrounded by a slightly surreal rectangular wishing well. You borrow special cooking dishes, place your food in the hole, replace the lid and wait for dinnertime!

The weather has been great today, lots of sunshine and pretty warm so we have returned to shorts and t-shirts. We are hoping it will stay this way as we travel on down to catch the ferry to South Island on Wednesday morning. It seems quite amazing that we have nearly come to the end of the first part of our adventure, but equally we still have two more weeks to go in the motorvan. Everyone we meet keeps telling us that we will enjoy South Island more than North Island; even the cashier in Countdown was telling us that, in her opinion, it is a completely different world - albeit in the same country!