A Trip to Australia and New Zealand
Tauranga to Rotarua
Again the night of sailing with the new port of call the following morning - this one Tauranga. Unlike all of our other stops, this time we joined another couple, rented an automobile, and took off for the hinterland as soon as we hit port. We drove for several hours through the countryside and thoroughly enjoyed the views of lakes and mountains, fields and farms, lush vegetation and beautiful gardens - as if it was all one gigantic national park.
At one point along the way, we stopped in a small village and took a delightful walk through a creek side refuge marveling at the mix of recognizable and unrecognizable plants. Obviously the combination of transplanted English gardners thrown in with a lush growing climate and fertile soil was a dynamite combination too good for the New Zelanders to pass up. Tree ferns growing next to roses, hibiscus alongside chrysanthemums, and then a profusion of unknown exotic plants and flowers.
We next continued on to Rotarua which is an active volcanic area with lots of fumaroles reminiscent of Yellowstone. A dramatic health spa catering to Europeans was once located there and is now being preserved as a museum. It was totally destroyed during the nineteenth century in a dramatic and powerful earthquake, but is now being rebuilt as a tourist attraction.. Rotarua is an important Maori cultural center and the museum has an interesting collection of indigenous artifacts. We had an excellent lunch at a small eatery named "The Fat Dog" in town and then visited a Maori church, before heading back to the ship via a different route than the one that we had taken earlier. We drove through Tauranga on the way back to the ship, but were pressed for time and did not explore any of it's treasures. Maybe next time. One final note about this part of the trip - it was not as hard as we had imagined to get used to driving on "the wrong side of the road." We sometimes got into the vehicle on the wrong side, but once behind the wheel everything seemed to sort itself out pretty rapidly and we found New Zealand drivers to be very courteous. Finding our way around was easy as well - we had a GPS system in the vehicle and a soothing female voice gave us very precise instructions as to where to turn and which highway to look for at the next corner.
