Our Judy (the car) is now covered in bird shit thanks to the trees in the Rotorua campsite. After the Maori evening we decided she needed to take pride in her
Maori heritage, so we renamed her 'waka Judy', waka meaning canoe.

In the morning after shopping we set off and drove to Lake Taupo, where we had our first bit of traffic jam due to the Iron Man which was being held there that day.

The lake was brilliantly blue, with the snowcapped mountains of Tongariro National Park in the background. We stopped at a lookout for some photos. At about 1 we stopped for lunch and had a pee at the most sophisticated toilets I've ever been on!

The door opened by pressing a button. The toilet flushed itself as soon as you washed your hands or if you opened the door. There is also a 'loiter alarm': if you spend over ten minutes in the toilet, an alarm goes off and you have one minute to leave before the door automatically opens! Very impressive stuff.

We had great clear views of Mt Ngauruhoe, which is now world famous as 'Mount Doom' from Lord of the Rings, so took some more photos. We arrived at Okahune a little bit later, which we saw because there was a giant carrot by the road. Okahune, apparently, apart from being gateway to Tongariro National Park, is also carrot country...

At the campsite, we set everything up right by the stream, we had a look in town and then made mash and fish for dinner, while being surrounded by the Dutch families and their offspring.