Fact.
So.... William Pike was excellent speaker and it was a great evening - he told his 'story' about the night of the accident and then went on to explain about the William Pike Challenge Award whereby local kids will be taking part in several challenges (climbing Mt Raupehu, Tongariro and several others, kayaking, camping, cycling, swimming etc) local companies are sponsoring the kids and William is their mentor and helping to raise awareness of the programme which sounds brilliant.
For the rest of that day I had been out and about exploring Taupo - I went to 'craters of the moon" (a geothermal park which was very eggy) Huka Falls, Aratiatia rapids and last but by no means least, prawn fishing at Huka prawn! I was there about an hour and caught one prawn, whoopeee! It would have been much easier with a net but I had a bamboo rod - when the rod is immersed in the water, it's really hard to tell the difference between a prawn hanging on with its pincers and a prawn caught on the hook!
On Friday I left Taupo and headed to Rotorua! Wow, it smells there! Rotorua is a lovely place, really pretty even though it is quite commercialised. After a long walk, I found my hostel and dropped off my bags, grabbed a map and headed straight for the zorb site on the bus (with a little bit of sing along Rod Stewart with the bus driver on the way there... you're in my heart, you're in my soul... haha!) Woooo.....zorbing is amazing! For those of you who don't know, a definition of zorbing: being strapped into a giant inflatable rubber ball and rolled down a steep hill. Aqua zorbing: much the same except you have a few bucket-fulls of water for company and you are not strapped in so it's like being in a giant washing machine! I did zorbing and aqua zorbing - three times! It was fantastic and the guys running the site were very amusing so I had a few fits of the giggles! After zorbing I booked on to a maori 'cultural evening'. Wow, that was brilliant! Far more people than I expected which was a shame but it was a really good evening all the same. There was lots of beautiful traditional maori singing and dancing and rituals such as Hongi (the rubbing of noses) I learnt lots about the maori culture and etiquette and really found it interesting. Of course the evening was made better by my close proximity to men jumping around in skimpy loin cloths haha! We ate a hangi dinner (cooked in the earth oven) which was mahhooousive, I felt a bit like a waddling penguin afterwards! After dinner, we went for a walk in the bush and saw glow worms which were pretty cool! On Saturday I went to Te Puia museum in the morning - I was just in time for the guided tour that was starting so I went along on that - the tour guide rebecca was half maori and very knowledgeable about the local tribes and maori culture. She showed us the geysers and they were erupting just as we arrived which was amazing to see - the water is fed in from the stream running through the park, as the land is volcanic, the lava heats the water up approx 2km below the surface and when it reaches boiling point the geysers erupt - it happens around 23 times a day. She was full of facts and information I can't even begin to remember all of it! I saw 2 north island brown kiwi birds REAL close in the kiwi house in the museum!!!!! they are funny! Rebecca also took us to the weaving and carving schools which are local schools for young people (carving is open to men only) to keep the maori traditions alive. 15 are selected per year and the courses last 3 years. A brilliant idea.
Today (Sunday) I was packed and ready to go to Waiteti lodge where I was going to spend the day fly fishing tommorow. I went to check my emails before i set off to the lodge and had an email saying that the guy who runs the fly fishing sessions was supposed to be arriving home from holiday today but he's extended his holiday until 2nd April! BoooHOOOOOOO!!!!!! really gutted as its the only affordable fly fishing tuition I've come across- most are in excess of $250 and this was only $55 for 5 hours tuition. Ah well, these things happen. So, I figured although I would liek to stay in Rotorua there wasnt much else I reeeeeally wanted/needed to do and my time would probably be better spent elsewhere so I literally ran for the bus as there is only one bus a day to my next stop (Thames on The Coromandel Peninsula)! PHEW, I made it in time and here I am now in a lovely hostel in Thames. I dumped my bags and saw that there was a dog in the hostel so I asked the owners and they let me take her for a walk - her name is Nina and she is lovely but not as lovely as my Milly - I do miss her so. Anyhow, we walked for miles along the coastal track and she was puffed out when we got back - she keeps coming to find me in the hostel now, I have made a friend :) Oh dear my internet time has run out so I'll have to go... sorry if there's lots of spelling and grammar mistakes, haven't had time to check over! xx
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