New Zealand #16 - Ohope Beach, Rotorua and a Maori Village - North Island

Based on our previous can't-find-lunch-anywhere drive in this area of North Island we buy sandwiches at a grocery as a backup before leaving Gisborne. The weather is uncharacteristically warm, 24 Celsius, and sunny, for most of the day.

Entrance to Tamaki Maori Village.

Driving out we see numerous windbreaks with very large trees, unidentified, around the four sides of small fruit tree orchards, maybe an acre or so in size, possibly apples but other fruit as well, a very interesting way to plant and protect fruit trees from the strong winds coming off the sea.

Relaxing on the verandah of our very nice motel at Ohope Beach...

...with this view on to the Bay of Plenty...

...and this one as well.

We find flat whites at the Hard Drive Café in Matawai but nothing else, and find out the local history, once prosperous with railway and road construction, but now almost a ghost town. Next we travel through the magnificent Waioeke Gorge, the river taking us right down to the sea at Opotiki. We drive along the Bay of Plenty then swing inland and then out onto a peninsula to our next overnight, Ohope Beach, a great unit right by the beach with no caravans in front to spoil the view at this time of year, probably the best location and unit thus far.

For the first time in New Zealand we actually walk on a beach in reasonable weather, looking out to the volcano remnant Whale Island...

...and return on the lagoon side of the peninsula where there is a sheltered anchorage. This is another wonderful spot that we could have spent more time exploring and chilling - maybe next visit!

Kuirau Park thermal springs

No surprise there is some rain overnight, and clouds for our very short drive over low mountains again, the last remnant of the higher mountains we first saw on South Island. Our caravan park in Rotorua has a nice pool and mineral baths, which are warm and very relaxing as we spend most of the day chilling and catching up with laundry.

The next day we take a short walk to Kuirau Park thermal springs, a free city park which has the smell of sulphur, with many pools of various sizes spewing steam and in some cases bubbling mud.

On returning to the caravan park we use the mineral baths again, then actually get some sun by the pool, a rare opportunity thus far in New Zealand.

Entrance to the village - you can just see the trumpeter announcing the arrival of our tribe.

There are several 'authentic Maori experiences' advertised but based on reviews and program we select Tamaki Maori Village. We are picked up at 6:25 right outside our park in a small van and are taken to their offices, which I think is a bit inefficient but it's actually quite well-organized and useful. We get tickets indicating our bus number, driver, and table number, but more importantly are given handouts, available in several languages, that explain what we are going to see and how to react.

A very good model of a village at the tour office.

The drive to Tamaki is very short but our driver adds some information and teaches us a few Maori words. En route we have to select a Chief for our bus, and eventually a young woman volunteers her husband. We later learn they are Portuguese, from Porto, so we converse a bit about our winters in the Algarve.

It is evening of course, and the lighting among the tall trees is very dramatic.

The entire Maori cultural experience is fascinating: the warrior’s arriving by canoe to challenge our Chief, and when it is clear we come in peace the Hongi greeting; various small ‘houses’ where different things are explained, like training young warriors, weaving flax, and the Haka, where all the men participate.

Training young warriors with the short spear, the branches on the ground used to teach footwork and improve agility...

brightonbonnie with our favourite young Maori - a very frightening man had we not known what to expect...

...men learning the Haka - that's me second from the right! I think you'll agree I was the best student!

We then see our meal, the Hangi, taken out of a large pit in the ground where it has been cooking for about 4 hours...

...and from there go into a theatre to be entertained with traditional dances and singing, which gives the dining staff time to prepare the meal. When we sit at our designated table we meet a young couple from Sydney with a young boy and girl who we noticed in our group during the tour of the houses, and another couple, the man being one of The Beards, an Australian band on their farewell tour, and have a wonderful conversation with all of them, who are very interested in our 2 month roadtrip through Oz. The meal is very good, chicken and lamb (which brightonbonnie eats!); fish and oysters; potato, kumara (sweet potato, a Kiwi favourite, which I love) and carrot; stuffing; salad; and brown pudding with white sauce and Pavlova (invented in New Zealand - who knew) – which brightonbonnie has been dying to have! All in all a wonderful experience!

There's a lot more to do in the Rotorua area, for example other thermal springs which are an hour or so distant, so we add this area to our rapidly expanding list of places we want to visit again!

PS - if you've enjoyed this post please check out my first 15 New Zealand posts, the previous 19 posts in my Australia series, and the 3 before that as we started our 90 day roadtrip in Tahiti!

And please join us in my next post as we visit Hobbiton. Are you ready @ewkaw?

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You can find this, and other exciting adventures from some great travelling Steemians at Steemit Worldmap (I just stole this line from @shellyduncan so thanks to her for a great way to publicize a great travelers tool):

!steemitworldmap -38.150803 lat 176.244817 long Rotorua New Zealand d3scr