We ate at an excellent mediteranian retaurant for our last night in Tauranga, Zeytin.
Good food at the waterfront of Tauranga.
Well,last night when we got back to our room, we found that a message had been put under our door from the White Island tours. We were expecting one that told us when we would be departing for the tour the following morning. Instead, the message was that the tour had been canceled due to gale force wind forecast. Which was a real bummer, since we didn't have anything else planned for the day.
We consulted the books and maps and decided to go to Wai-o-tapu geothermal park. It was somewhat on the way to our next overnight spot in Waitomo, and was listed as a cool place to go. So we got up this morning and started down the road. It was pretty neat, but there were alot of people there. The park had an abundance of bubbling pools of mud, acidic water, sulfur vents, and boiling waterfalls. We spent about 2 hours there on a walking tour. Near the end of the tour there is a huge spring of hot steaming water. Due to the minerals in the water, there is a white crust on top, and a bright orange layer of deposits just below the water line. The water itself looks bright green. It made for some interesting photos...
At the end of the walk was a huge, snot green pool they called Devil's something or the other ( I didn't pay much attention to the names of the things ). After we finished the tour we got back in the car and headed for Waitomo ~2h drive.
When we got to Waitomo there was an ostrich farm by the side of the road with one of
them next to the fence. I pulled over, and Katie and I got out the check out this one
big bird. We inadvertantly started a big ostrich party as they came over to see if we
were going to feed them something.
AWWSTRICH PARTY:
We checked into our Hostel the KiwiPaka, put the sheets on the bed, and went to grab a bite to eat. We ate at the HuHu cafe. While we were sitting there a guy came in and was talking to what appeared to be the owner of the cafe before he sat down. I overheard him saying something about caving training. (We were not able to book the trip with the caving company that we originally wanted to, because they said that their guides would be training on Thursday). The guy sat down close to us, and after a little while, I caught his eye and asked if he worked with the company that we wanted to originally book. Turns out this guy was Kieran McKay, the owner of the company (Absolute Adventure). So we wound up talking to him for close to an hour about what we absolutely shouldn't miss while we are here. He gave us some good advice on some places to check out. He was a really nice guy, and we had a good conversation on climbing, exploring, and some of the details of running the business that he does.
We got into discussing the liability of guiding folks in a inherently dangerous setting. He told us that in NZ you cannot sue guides if you get hurt, but that if you do get hurt, NZ will pay for all of your medical expenses. It's kind an insurance that all companies pay into. He said that in his experience in guiding people that if you let them know up front that they are responsible for their own actions, they tend to do a much better job at taking care of themselves, while if you have a guide that helps folks every step of the way, they tend to become dependent, stop thinking for themselves, and end up not taking very good care of themselves.
The trips he guides start out with one of the most difficult things they do on the
entire trip, which gets the clients into the right frame of mind. This keeps them safe for the entire time.
After dinner, Katie and I went to do a walk around on the Rauakuri Walk, a path that
went through the forest and led us into a natural tunnel, and into some little caves.
There were a few little waterfalls along the way too. Neat stuff.
Tomorrow is caving with one of the tour companies local to here. We'll see how it goes.
They weren't our first choice, but it'll still be good fun.
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