Rotorua (for Jan. 14)

This morning we tracked down the rental car company, even though the revised address was already out of date. He said just go ahead and get it fixed, so we went to the Firestone store. He said the tire was an odd size (16 inch wheel) and phoned around to everybody nearby trying to get one, but without success. Since it was Saturday, we decided we would press on and try to phone ahead to Wellington on Monday so that someone there will have a tire for us before we have to drop off the car and take the ferry to the South Island.

This all took until about noon, so we went from there to the Whakarewarewa Thermal Village for a tour, lunch, and Maori cultural performance. The village is built on a thermal area and there are boiling mud pits, steam, and hot water bubbling up to the surface throughout the village. They cook chicken in hot boxes sitting over steam vents and vegetables in a cheesecloth bag in a boiling pool. As the water runs off and cools, they catch it in concrete tubs for their baths.

We finished up there by mid afternoon, so we drove down to their version of Wascana Park along the lake. We found another Maori meeting house and a totem pole from Canada. We returned for a swim, a little lounging by the pool, supper, and blogging.