Maori and the Shire

So, I know that I said yesterday was a full day but today was even fuller, if you can believe it. I woke up early as usual (early for me is 7am) but still had a hard time getting going. Yesterday I had booked a tour of the Whakarewarewa Thermal Village where local Maori still reside. That wasn’t until 10am, so I was able to take my time getting ready, checking out of the hostel and eating breakfast.

Breakfast was at the Zippy Central Café again but a little faire. I had some muesli with milk, yoghurt and a banana. Of course, my drink was another glass of feijoa juice. I swear, I’m going to drink New Zealand dry of that stuff. So tasty. Breakfast was good but I had forgotten that a lot of milk products on an empty stomach don’t always agree with me in the morning. Nothing serious this time, just some mild nausea for awhile.

Around 9:30 I drove over to the village which is situated about 2km south of the town centre where I was staying in Rotorua. I puttered around while I waited for the tour to start, which ended up beginning a little after 10am. The group was a sizeable one, which most everyone being from Australia, as well as some Canadians and a couple from the Czech Republic and another from France.
The tour guide was incredible friendly and quite humourous. She started out by having us recite the vowel sounds in Maori diction and then had us say the full name of the village. If you look at my pictures, you’ll see it’s a long one. The brochure is in the car, so I can’t tell you the meaning of the name. The village is just usually referred to as Whaka (Woka) for short.

She guided us around many of the different thermal pools and steam vents around the village. When new vents form in the ground, a pipe is stuck in there so a hole doesn’t grow. It also helps to relieve pressure. Most of the ground we were walking upon was only about a foot thick and hollow underneath, which was pretty incredible. Even more incredible, is that it was warm, and in some places, hot to the touch. It’s like this year round, which she was saying is wonderful in the winter. Though, I don’t image it’s too great in the summer, though a small price to pay for the other things the area has to offer. For example, one of the pools, which is 100+ degrees celcius is used for cooking food, like eggs, corn, shellfish and crustations. This particular pool is fed by spring, so it’s just mineral water, versus some of the others have mud and other deposits within them, so that makes this one also safe to drink (once it’s cooled down, of course). It’s apparently also incredibly deep, though they’ve not measured it beyond 50ft down and it still goes on from there.

Some of the steam vents have wooden boxes constructed upon them where they can steam wrapped up food, from veggies, to casserole and meats like chicken and beef. Talk about an efficient way to cook without using power. Though, the Maori houses all have the regular, modern conveniences, so the steam boxes are mostly used when they are without power or to cook food for the tourists for the only geothermal hangi (Maori steamed meal) in town.

Oh, and they also use the waters for bathing, which are directed into tubs at the bath house that is used by all the villagers. Though, apparently bathing in mineral water can make you ill if you’re not used to it.

After viewing the two local geysers, we went over to the cultural meeting house and then up to the cemetery. Here, our guide left us and directed us go to where the cultural performance would be held. The performance was only about a half hour but it was an incredibly interesting to watch, especially if you’ve seen Whale Rider. There are some videos in the albums, though Picasa isn’t showing them at a very good quality. Lastly, before leaving I partook in a geothermal meal, which was all steamed, including the pudding. It was pretty tasty and quite filling.

I left around 1pm in the afternoon, which was earlier than I had planned and drove up to Matamata. Driving this time around was a real pleasure because the roads were gentle curves through the rolling, green hills, which is sheep and horse country. It took exactly how long Google Maps said it would to get there. I had only planned to be there for a quick photo opportunity with the “Welcome to Hobbiton” sign in the middle of the town. Outside Matamata on a private farm is where the Shire scenes were filmed in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I even let myself be a complete dork and listen to the Shire tracks on the LOTR: Fellowship of the Ring soundtrack. However, once I was in the tourist information building (i-Site), I changed my mind spontaneously and decided to take a Hobbiton film set tour. The reason I hadn’t wanted to do it was because most of it is taken down so there wasn’t supposed to be much to see, but I thought the stories might be worth it. Plus, I was there, so might as well, right?

Well, all I will say is that I’m really glad I took the tour. The farm is about 20 mins outside of Matamata. I followed the tour van, as I planned to drive down to Waitomo Caves from there. No sense in doubling back. Now, I’m not exactly sure how much I can say about my experience, so I’ll say very little, since this is online. However, if you want me to tell you about it in person, I can. Reason being, is that as of 6 weeks ago, it’s become a working production set again. We had to sign paperwork to say that we wouldn’t let any information out online, especially pictures. Though, we were allowed to take as many as we wanted. They just can’t leave our personal computers. Okay, mouth shut for the rest of it, though it was pretty awesome to see if you’re a LOTR dork.

At the end of the tour, there was a quick demonstration of sheep shearing since the people that own the land, the Alexanders, are sheep farmers. Also, two cute lambs were brought out that we got to bottle feed. Only one was interested and boy, he was hungry.

From there, I drove down to Waitomo Caves and got there after dark. I don’t really want to drive around in the dark if I can help it because I’m missing scenery, but the Hobbiton tour was worth it. I made a quick decision to stay at a small B&B, the Waitomo Caves Guest Lodge, instead of a hostel, mainly because I could find it being that the sign was brightly lit. The couple that owns it is very nice, and it’ll be nice to have a room to myself that has a bathroom en suite. Plus, there some nice touches, like homemade cookies in the room and decent internet connection for $2/hr! Since it includes breakfast in the morning, the price of the room doesn’t end up being that much more expensive.

Finally, all my pictures uploaded. Have at it! :D Though, I didn’t do a lot of editing, so there are some blurry ones in there.

Oooh, there was a pretty, black kitty *inside* the restaurant where I had dinner. I liked that. She had a collar so I'm pretty sure was a resident. She let me pet her quite a bit. I miss my kitties.

Also, thank you to Corina for giving me some information about what April 25th was all about in the comments on my previous post… ANZAC day.. hence the poppies that some people were wearing.

Very lastly, thanks to everyone for your comments. I worry that my posts get long and no one would want to read all that. However, as I said, in the end it doesn’t matter since I’m writing for me, eh?