Rotorua Travel Blogs

On April 26th a few friends of mine and I have been to Rotorua. And hey, the day became even much more fun than we had thought. How come? Of course, the weather wasn’t on our side and it was rainy all day long but we wouldn’t have been stopped by ugly wet autumn weather, no panic. But maybe …

In half-sleep I could feel the girls were already up and moving around the room. I woke up feeling cold. A little too cold. It seems no matter how cold the weather is, during the night I'll kick off my covers. Childhood habit I guess. I opened my eyes and found another discovery. I quickly rolled o…

We headed for Rotorua this morning with a short stop in Hamilton. There are some interesting little towns along the way. We are staying in a hotel that looks out over the thermal pool. On arrival at the hotel I confuse the receptionist as I asked her if we had the 'gulfview room' but after saying i…

We zitten weer bij een of andere actieplek. Soms heb ik het idee, dat het wel erg commercieel is, zo van hoeveel excursies kunnen we verkopen. Ik heb een buspas gekocht bij de Kiwi Experience en zij verzorgen zeg maar het vervoer. Het is wel gezellig, maar super massaal. Echt de bussen zitten …

rotorua is the heartland of nz's maori culture. it is also home to some of the most amazing geothermal wonders i've ever seen. i would find steam rises from cracks, gardens, pathways and even residential streets.  just minutes from city centre there are geysers, boiling pools of mud, silica te…

Breakfast at the Duxton Hotel was awesome!  I had scrambled eggs with sun dried tomatoes with a side of bacon.  There must have been 5 eggs on my plate!  Of course my mother always taught me to eat all on my plate, so I was stuffed when I finished! Our first stop of the day was the …

Man, the $20 dollars for the Polynesian spa were certainly well spent.  I had a cracking sleep and woke up without my usual backache, a great start to a busy day.  Even better, the skies were clear and a radiant sun greeted my cave-man looks as I dived out of the boot of Betsy gasping for…

This day we are first going to WAI-O-TAPU thermal wonderland. There you can walk along several small lakes in different colors. I'm not sure what the names were, but I think I saw Artists Palette, the Rainbow crater, sulphurs cave, the blue lake with the red on the sides is the champagne pool and t…

I woke up early because I hadn't gone out the night before. I think it was a combination of the Polynesian Spa and jet lag. Nevertheless, I was awake bright and early. I got ready and had some breakfast in the hotel's restaurant. After breakfast I drove a short distance to Te Puia. Te Puia is …

I guess having just 4 hours to hang around at home before I had to head to Rotorua airport was a bit of a blessing.  Ma was not enjoying the morning as she awaited my impending departure but I had a couple of things to keep me busy; run the car, final check of e-mails, sort final messages…

We left the hotel around 9.20 A.M. for the Lady Knox Geyser that erupts daily at 10.15 A.M. It’s located at Wai-O-Tapu, 20 minutes drive from Rotorua.It is recommended that the tourists should go to buy the tickets before 9.45 A.M as there’s a long queue.There was quite crowded around that time…

7:30 am Leave hotel for breakfast on mountain top restaurant ( Mt Ngongotaha)  9:00 am Visit to the Agrodome and various ram, sheep and dairy demonstrations.  Then to Whakarewarewa Thermal Reserve and the Maori Arts and Crafts Institute.  Continue to a model Maori village and the …

Rotorua is an active geothermal area and as such the whole place smells of rotten eggs. There’s no escaping the smell but you soon get used to it. They have bubbling sulphurous pools in the main park and new ones are popping up randomly from time to time. The main bonus (as far as Caz was concern…

We're in the beautiful city of Rotorua, New Zealand. It's past midnight and although we are extremely tired, we can't forced ourselves to go to bed.Immediately after arriving to Rotorua and leaving our stuff in the hotel, we went to take the bus to a place called Wai-O-Tapu Thermal Wonderland, we w…

Yesterday we took off on the Jayride Rideshare Challenge.  After just a short weekend visiting Rod's family, it was time for our road trip to begin.  The goal: drive from Auckland down to Queenstown sharing rides the entire way.  The purpose of the challenge was to prove that no matt…