Rotorua and its volcanic activity

Tuesday 5th and Wednesday 6th December
We left our friends on Tuesday morning. Wayne went to work and Jan dropped us at the bus stop before starting to work as well.
We had decided to stop one night in Rotorua and enjoy some of the most popular touristic sites of New-Zealand.

I won't tell much about the visits, you'll see some more pictures down here. Just something about the geysers. Without kidding, waiting for a geyser to erupt for one hour, and seeing that it happens, the power of the water, the sound of the eruption, the sight of the water high in the airs... It has the same effect on me than a beautiful end in a movie : I started crying. It was so beautiful...
On Wednesday, after visiting Wai-o-tapu, we took our bus back to Hamilton. From there, we still had 14km to hike before reaching our destination of the day, Whatawhata. We arrived just after the sunset. It was a pleasant walk through the farmlands.


The mountain at the back is Pirongia, we'll be there in a few days

At the pub where we pitched our tent, there were already 5 young Americans, that had just finished their 1st day of hike. It as refreshing to see them and they were really friendly and welcoming. Hope to see them again later on the trail!





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why walking 44km when you could hike 25?

Image
Monday 11th December 2017  When we woke up, the rain welcomed us. Val came to catch us and dropped us off at the start of the trail. We're ready to walk 84 km in the next 4 days. We know that it's an easy trail, because it's tailored for bicycles. We start walking around 12 noon, under the rain. Rain is a good friend, that tends to stick to you when it catches you. Very good, we're not impressed, there's a hut where we can stay tonight, no need to pitch the tent. A typical Maori statue at the entrance of the forest  To reach the hut, we need to take a sidewalk. The nice path turns into a muddy one and it rains twice as hard. Lucky us! Worse than that, when we reach the hut, the 4 bunk beds are already occupied... But... These 4 people are TA hikers and we know them. Two of them are a couple. We call them the Lovebirds (name found by our friend Kelvin) because they are on their honeymoon travel. And the lovely lovebirds offer us to give us one of their 2
Read more

In the bush, without George

Image
The 12th of November 2017 Another day off at Haruru Falls. We decided to hike to Paihia, through the mangrove, just to see how Marie-Laure's ankle is doing. It's an easy day with 7 km only, between the forests and the see.  We also board on a boat to see dolphins. We are feeling like children as we look at them, so excited at the sight of these dolphins playing so close to our boat. We still have some time to visit the small town of Russell , full of history. There, we go to the small supermarket, and we meet Sheryl. She works there, and immediately asks us if we are Te Araroa hikers. She's a trail angel (people taking care of the hikers) and she invites us to camp at her house tomorrow, in Waikare. Great! It's also our second and last day at Kristel's family place. It was such a great chance to meet them. One of the best experiences that a long trail offers  is probably the occasions it offers to meet the people. The 13th of November 2017 Kristel
Read more
Image
Testing our new tent MSR Hubba Hubba NX   Training in Belledonne We're back ! We spent an amazing time in France on GR 738 , where we hiked in breathtaking places during 8 days.  High peaks, lakes, clouds, thunderstorms, sun, chamois, ibex,... this high elevation path gave us everything we would have dreamed of. Despite the fact that I had experienced some back pain early July, we  decided to give a try to this new trail and carry 4 to 5 days of food and the full material for the bivouacs. Marie-Laure was kind enough to carry a little more, and we ended up with 11 to 13 kilograms each of us.   Travelling clouds What did we carry in our backpack? - A tent for 2 - Our sleeping bags - Our small sleeping pads (120cm long only) - A sleeping bag sheet - A 1 liter pot for cooking - 2 mugs (1 for each) - A stove - 2 spoons - A lighter - Sandals for the evening - A rain jacke - A jumper for the cold evenings and a thin layer to add just in case Marie-Laure
Read more