Thursday, November 3, Rotorua

 Rotorua is in the caldera of a once-active volcano, and has quite a large number of hot springs. That's what we came to see.

The Maori festival was great, but I didn't find the hot springs particularly impressive, especially after having been to Noboribetsu. It's basically a number of pools, many of which are at 212 F (100 C). They look nice from a distance but pretty ugly up close. Some have steam rising from them, They're slightly stinky, and only a few showed any bubbles or other motion.

The Maori influence here in New Zealand is very strong.It seems as if they've incorporated native islanders into their culture in a way we have completely failed to do with native Americans. Of course, that's just an impression; I don't really know anything about it.







Messing around on playground equipment


A telephone booth! With telephone!




Comments

  1. Paula MatuszekNovember 5, 2022 at 9:17 PM

    In fairness to Rotorua's geothermal attractions, the town is on the edge of the caldera, and we never made it to any of the areas such as Te Puia that have significant geysers, fumaroles, mud pools, etc, etc.. We also didn't make it to the Polynesian Spa, which has 28 bathing hot pools of various temperatures and compositions (acid, alkaline). So more like Noboribetsu than what we actually did suggests.

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