Big Trip

Stopped off at a glass blowing studio on our way up to Rotorua to look at their beautiful wares, and some actual glass blowing. They didn't seem to be working as hard at the blowing as I remember from previous visits to glass blowers, but maybe they were just being cool for the audience. Then we went on to Orakei Korako, reckoned to be one of the finest thermal areas in New Zealand, and possibly the world, and with good reason. The landscape here is even more unreal than at Craters of the Moon. There's a huge silica terrace on the other side of a lake, which you have to cross to visit the area. Then you walk up past the Diamond Geyser (yes, really) and across the red, yellow, black & white terrace itself while it all steams gently around you, and hot water trickles down into the lake.Then you walk up past the orange-fringed black pool the shape of Africa to the Artists Palette, a vast white area pock marked with bubbling, steaming blue pools, mud pockets and empty, steaming craters. There's a 120-ft deep geothermal cave with a mirror pool at the bottom, in which the water was so clear and still that Max thought he could walk on the rocks and ended up with a wet foot.
All the time you're aware of the feeling that you're walking on something fragile and perhaps a bit unpredictable, which is slightly disconcerting if you dwell on it too much. Anyway, having done all that we went on to Rotorua, a nice short drive, dumped our bags at the motel, and headed for the gondola & luge, the same as in Queenstown. The same amount of fun, but more queueing and a much longer chairlift ride back up.
Having exhausted our arms, especially Erin's, on the luge, Sarah suggested I should do something exciting on my birthday and try the Sky Swing. Erin was thrilled to bits to find that she was old enough & tall enough to do it with me, so we both went. Well, it's a big swing, isn't it? Erin loved every second. I think my favourite moment was pulling the rope to release us at the start of the swing. I won't say anything else, but the DVD will be available for rent when we return.
Finished the day off by stuffing ourselves silly with a buffet dinner at the restaurant at the top of the gondola and watching the sun set over Rotorua. Not a bad day I s'pose.