Rotorua - Thermals and Kiwi

**even longer post**

Rotorua…
I just went over my pictures and realized that overall, they aren’t terribly interesting. I even forgot to take an obligatory self portrait that I took the past two days. However, today was probably the fullest day and all of the most interesting parts happened without pictures. This was usually because I wasn’t allowed to take any.

The day started at 7am again but I had a hard time getting going since I didn’t sleep particularly well. Plus, it was cloudy which probably made me drag my feet a little. At around 9 or so, after taking a shower and checking the internet a little, I booked another night in the same hostel. The bed isn’t the best but it was better than gathering all my stuff up again for another place.
I had breakfast at Zippy Central. It was similar to yesterday’s but not as good. Still, it fit the bill since it was mostly protein, which I felt I needed for the walking I had ahead of me. From there, I walked to the Rotorua Art and History Museum. In it’s heyday it was a bath house to which tourists flocked to “take the cure” of the local, natural hot spring waters that are ever abundant in the region. I first took in a movie about the eruption of the peaks of Tarawera mountain that forever changed the local landscape in 1886. The movie was incredibly well done and included lights on the ceiling to represent starts when it was night time and shaking benches during the parts of the eruption. Plus, I’m pretty sure the narrator guy was Jake from the movie “Once Were Warriors”.

From there, I viewed some amazing contemporary weaving by Maori women. Truly inspiring. Also, exhibits of Tarawera eruptions, Maori carvings and pictures of the B Company 28 Maori Battalion during WWII. There was another movie that accompanied that portion which gave personal accounts of the surviors as well as some of what the women experienced. It was incredibly moving and I was in tears before it was over. I had an “Ahh..” moment when one of women spoke of her children and grandchildren asking her about that time. She said that it was so painful to speak about but she felt that it was important for them to know. Made me wonder if Oma feels the same way, which it isn’t always that easy to get her to talk about that time either.

Around the Maori taonga or items of culture significance (I believe that’s the correct meaning of the word) green leaves were placed as a symbol of the gift of life. Also, plastic poppies were placed on many of the pictures of the surviving Maori soldiers as young men. Not sure why but I enjoyed both of these gestures that I’m sure were placed by Maori visitors.

From this exhibit I walked up to the viewing terrace on the roof and had a wonderful view of the surrounding area, mostly Lake Rotorua. Ahh, I forgot to mention that the museum is situated in Government Gardens which also houses a Polynesian Spa, Blue Baths and some active thermals. Though, I didn’t visit anything else except the thermals.

I then took a walking tour of Rotorua, with proper shoes this time. Though, that didn’t help because it was pretty hot today and I had my hoodie with me. I walked up to Lake Rotorua and photographed the black swans and then walked over to a Maori village which is situated on edge of the lake, amid more thermal pools and bubbling mud. Turns out that they were charging to view the village, which I understand since it’s private but decided not to stay even though the young guys at the visitors information were quite cute, but I had other things to do. I then walked over to Kuirua Park where you can view numerous thermal pools and bubbling pools of mud for free. I enjoyed the cool shade of the trees more than anything since the air was hot and humid around the pools and certainly had a distinct smell of sulpher. There is a small mineral pool where you can soak your feet and if I had been wearing flip flops, I probably would have, never mind that it was full of Japanese tourists that were happily, and loudly, chattering away. That’s not anything against Japanese tourists. I just wasn’t in the mood to try to wedge myself in there when it’s supposed to be a soak.

From the park, I wandered over to Fat Dog Café for a late lunch. This is a menu I’ve been drooling over since before I left the States so I couldn’t leave without trying it. I had an excellent vegetarian panini which was a pumpkin humus, feta cheese and red peppers. I thoroughly enjoyed that, plus the accompaning green lettuce and red beet salad.

So, for the afternoon/evening I had planned to go to Rainbow Springs Nature Park. I wasn’t planning to do this until this morning but I couldn’t pass up the chance to have a Kiwi encounter and I’m sure glad that I did. The Nature Park itself was pretty standard but still fairly beautiful with mostly native species of plants, fish (huge trout and freshwater eel) that swam in pools and streams that flowed throughout the park, lizards and birds. There’s even a natural spring in the park from which you can fill a bottle provided to you at entrance.

The best part was the 40+ minute tour of the Kiwi Encounter building. Basically, a better way to describe it is that it’s the largest Brown Kiwi conservation building in New Zealand. They take eggs from Kiwi laid in the wild and hatch them at the facitility and then when the reach a certain size, they are released back into the wild in the same area from which the egg was gathered. The egg, by the way, is 2/3 the size of the female’s body when it’s laid. That’s huge for this little bird! The father does all the brood work. Anyway, on the tour, I got to see where the eggs were incubated, though they only had one egg at this point in the year that is approximately 20 days away from hatching. Oh, I should mention that I was on the last tour of the day so I was lucky to get the tour guide to myself and was able to ask as many questions as I wanted. Also, I was able to watch them turn an egg in the incubator box, which they do every 2 hours. I got to see the brood boxes where the babies are kept after they are hatched. There was an enclosure with 2 of the most recent hatchlings that hatched earlier this month, Sumo and Wrestler, because Sumo was 400+ grams versus the usual 300 something when they hatch and Wrestler just likes to wriggle around when he’s being held by the caretakers.

Also, since it was late in the day, I was able to see them turn the lights on in another enclosure are for some of the older chicks. They are noctural so that signified bed time, though the young ones sleep 20s a day and one was running around instead of going to bed. Lastly, they took me outside to where some of the adults are kept and I was able to get up really close to a kiwi as the caretaker adminstered ear drops to a female that had an ear infection. She only has one leg since she was brought in after she was caught in an opposum trap and had to have her leg amputated, but apparently she does just fine. I listened to them 3 of the caretakers banter about some of what goes on with the kiwi, like them going of their food when they get upset or one getting out of the enclosure somehow.

You know, at this point there’s still much to write but I’m incredibly tired and no longer feel like writing. However, there’s more I want to relay about the kiwi! Like, the enclosuresa aren’t cages, but more like a big pen with a very low wall, so it’s very easy to peer over the side if they are right up against the wall digging around in the dirt with their beaks or watch a male jump around and roll on the ground. Plus, while I was in the night enclosure that opens when it becomes dark and the kiwi living there wake up, I began talking with another young woman. We got to chatting and ended up having dinner together at a local pub (local NZ beer and cider!). I would like to go more into detail, but I’ll just say that she’s living my dream. She’s from Germany and quit job that she had for 6 years as an editor for a magazine in Munich so she could travel around New Zealand for a year… all by herself! She is going to work odd jobs here and there but mostly she stays in hostels and eats from grocery stores to keep things cheap. She said she’s going to work over the winter, since she’s not much of an outdoor winter person and after that, she’ll explore the South Island. Man, makes me think. In comparison to her, I’m not brave at all.. I’m just taking a small vacation.

But for now, this has gotten FAR too long and I need to get to bed. Things to do in the morning. Overall, though, I’m deciding to write this for me in lieu of a journal. I don’t really expect you to read it but if you did.. good night!