Llew Wanders the World

Waking up in Auckland once again, I was well rested for the two or three hour drive down to Rotorua (and further on to points east and south.)

Since New Zealand lies on border between the Australasian and Pacific tectonic plates, there’s plenty of geological activity here, ranging from mountainbuilding, to earthquakes, to volcanoes, to hot springs end geysers. Rotorua is the spot in New Zealand with the highest concentration of geothermal activity of this last type, and though I’d been there before many years ago, I was looking forward to returning.

I headed out from the Darragh’s place into ominous looking weather. It wasn’t raining yet, but despite the spectacular changability of New Zealand skies, it seemed certain that it would before too long.

My premonition was proved correct when a light drizzle started coming down some fifteen minutes outside the city, and I once again got to make use of the car’s so-so windshield wipers (I’d been consistently mistaking the lever controlling them for that of the turn signal over the past several days.)

As I cruised along SH1, one of, if not the busiest roads in NZ, I spotted a fellow in a sheepskin coat thumbing a ride. As explained earlier, I’d vowed to pick up pretty much anyone I saw hitching, since I have much of it in my future once I hit the South Island. As such, I was happy to pull over and pick the fellow up. He turned out to be a mature university student headed back to Hamilton after visiting friends in Auckland for the weekend. Hamilton was less than an hours drive away, but nonetheless we had a nice chat about post-secondary education, politics and parallels between the situations of Canadian native peoples and New Zealand’s Maori (all of these have been popular conversation topics with a wide range of people down here.)

Before too long we reached Hamilton and I dropped the fellow off near his residence. The rain had stopped by now, but it threatened to return. This being the case, I took advantage of the stop to get out for a quick walk in a large Hamilton park. The walk took me along the Waikato River, New Zealand’s longest as it wound its course through the city.

After my quick walk I hopped back in the car and continued south towards Rotorua. Sure enough, the rain continued, and didn’t look to stop. Indeed, it turned into the hardest and lengthiest fall I’d experienced since arriving in the country. Despite the moisture which might have helped absorb some of the scent, the smell of sulphur hung heavy in the air of Rotorua, an ever-present reminder of the nearby geothermal activity.

The continuing rainstorm was a double-edged sword. It did limit what I could do with the afternoon in terms of visiting the geothermal areas near the city after my arrival, but it did allow me to take full advantage of the Funky Green Voyager, the great hostel where I was staying.

Thus it was that I spent the afternoon finishing off my Northland ‘blog entry, making my first phone calls home since my departure and cooking up a big pot of borscht (Eastern European beet and cabbage soup with vinegar. Very tasty and cheap to make.) The large quantity of borscht was a big positive: It provided lunches and dinners for me for three days, and offering it to strangers was a good quick way of making friends.

With one of these, an English fellow named Michael, I managed my first games of backgammon while travelling. While he wasn’t a particularly experienced player, I made the common (for me) error of suggesting moves and correcting his mistakes, thus leading to his 5-4 victory in a nine point match. (That’s explanation for how I lost and I’m sticking to it.)

The rain continued all afternoon and evening and thus led to an early bedtime, which set me up nicely for what proved to be a very full following day.

I woke up was delighted to find that the weather had broken in the night and the sun was shining. After breakfast I headed straight for Kuirau Park, the major public space in Rotorua. Even here, hot springs abound, and signs constantly remind the park goer not to stray into cordoned off areas, lest they crack through the fragile crust of the ground and into the steaming waters below.

While Kuirau park was nice, it had nothing on the Wai-O-Tapu thermal area, my next destination. A two hour walk takes the visitor to all of the highlights of the area, ranging from hot springs, to mudpots (pools of steaming, bubbling mud) and huge numbers of fumaroles (steam vents) and craters formed in areas where the acidic steam had eaten away at the earth for long enough to cause a collapse.

I’ve been spoiled for most geothermal areas in my time by having visited Yellowstone National Park in the US, but I still thoroughly enjoyed the walk around Wai-O-Tapu, and even my geothermally-jaded self managed to me impressed by a couple of features, most especially the sulphur coated waterfall, a brilliant yellow-green hot spring and the trees covered with an orange sulphur loving lichen.

One more quick stop on the way out took me to some mudpots that were far more viscous (and thus noisy and thus impressive) than the ones inside the main area of Wai-O-Tapu.

Heading out from the thermal area, I initially headed back towards Rotorua, planning to stop and bathe in some hot springs on the way back, but was still debating heading further south still. The reason for this was something I’d seen in the course of my walk around Wai-O-Tapu: The Wairakei Geothermal Generating Station. I consulted my Lonely Planet travel guide and discovered that tours were offered of the station. For an engineer such as myself this became a no-brainer. I turned the car around and headed for Taupo, the home of Wairakei, some 70km further south.

On arriving, I was disappointed to discover that tours of the generating station had not been offered for over two years, but I still thoroughly enjoyed the drive through the station’s pressurized steam piping up to a lookout that provided views over the full steamfield. In this area, boreholes have been drilled deep into the ground and pipes inserted. draw up super-hot groundwater which, released of the water and earth pressure above, turns to highly pressurized steam. This steam, in turn is piped to a central station where it is used to turn turbines that provide electricity, just in a conventional coal or gas fired thermal generating station.

I was a bit disappointed to have missed out on the turbines themselves and other parts of the station that would have undoubtedly been included in a tour, but was pleased that I was now afforded time to visit Craters of the Moon, another nearby geothermal area. Aside from having some interesting fumaroles, some more mudpots, and spectacular general scenery, Craters of the Moon also has an interesting story. It came into being when the Wairekei Station started power production. The activation of the plant lowered the water table, thus destroying a spectacularly active geyser field some kilometres away. In doing so, however, it released the pressure from some nearer-by groundwater, thus allowing it to begin boiling vigorously. This boiling produced steam that cracked open the ground above creating Craters of the Moon.

After heading out from CotM, I drove north again, headed for Rotorua, with one stop en route to bathe in Kerosene Creek, a stream that flows through a geothermal area and has several hot springs feeding directly into it. While the water was merely tepid, rather than even warm or hot, it was a lot warmer than any other natural water I’d felt in New Zealand, and quite comfortable to bathe in. Further, the waterfall that created a comfortably deep bathing pool provided a spectacular visual and aural backdrop.

Pausing only to help some kiwis push their car back onto the road (they’d driven down in order to get a bit closer to the river and had got stuck) I put on my swimsuit and headed out into the water. Just for a dip, mind you, not an actual swim since putting ones head below water can allow amoeba that thrive in the warm water to infiltrate through the nose or ears, leading to amoebic meningitis.

As I climbed out and dried off, the rain returned, leading to a miserable drive home, but a perfect night for doing something like baking banana oat bran muffins, which I did. (Another great way to make friends in a hostel.)

The next morning I woke up very early, thanks to the loan of an alarm clock from the three Swiss folks I shared a dorm with. This early rise was to allow me to make it to Wharanake in time to catch a tour boat headed to White Island, New Zealand’s most active volcano. Despite my best efforts, I arrived about 10 minutes late for the 8:30 departure, but thankfully I wasn’t the only one and they’d waited for us.

The ride out to the island was an entertaining trip 49km out into the genuinely blue water and 2m swells of the Bay of Plenty. Entertaining too was the trip from the main boat to the island itself on a small inflatable. Just prior to this trip, everyone was issued a hardhat and gas mask, just in case an eruption occurred while we were there.

Much more than entertaining was the walk around the island itself. Indeed, it was awe-inspiring. The views of the steep sided crater walls with steam billowing in the background were truly other-worldly, thanks in no small part due to the complete lack of life (save for a few small scraps of algae) in the interior of the island. Also very impressive were some of the individual features of the volcano. The sulphur crystals forming around some of the steam vents were amazing, as was the lake at the centre of the main crater. In addition to a surface temperature of 60 degrees Celsius (which gets much hotter as you descend) This lake apparently has a pH of 0.98, making it slightly more acidic than human stomach acid.

As the tour continued, we walked up to high points in the crater and were assaulted not only by the sulphurous stench of the island, but by windblown water droplets from some streams running on the surface of the island. Very high in dissolved metals and quite acidic, these droplets stung my eyes and I had to turn away from the impressive sights of the island seen from a high point within the crater.

Towards the end of the tour, we walked past the remains of the most recent sulphur mining venture on the island (one other was dismantled, and another was destroyed by a landslide.)

The thing that impressed me most about the island is how quickly and constantly it is changing. Landslides and eruptions cause regular (monthly in the case of landslides, once every few years in the case of eruptions) changes in the island’s landscape. In addition, events below surface cause changes as well, including the formation of the acid lake which, over the three years has filled up all but 6m of the previously 126m deep main crater.

After the tour of White Island I headed out to the East Cape. This (very approximately) 10000 square kilometre portion at the easternmost edge of the North Island has a population of under 7000, almost all of which is Maori.

As I headed out onto the cape, I spotted a Maori kid (kind of distressing that I’m old enough to think of 22 year olds as kids) looking for a ride in my direction. In keeping with my policy, I picked him up and Phillip (the hitcher) and I had a fine trip out on to the cape and into the evening. I dropped him off in his home town, and drove on into the dark, wanting to make a good start on the long trip around the cape so that I could slow down and enjoy it over the next couple of days.

As it turned out, I drove right through the tiny town where I’d planned on staying. Instead of doubling back, I decided to park the car in what seemed to be the lot near a public beach and sleep there for the night. Despite the car’s small size, it made for a comfortable one person bunkroom with the back seats folded down.

I woke with the sunrise in the early morning and was treated to the sight of a pretty (if somewhat kelp-y) beach in a medium sized bay. According to my East Cape guidebook, this beach, Ouraiti, was safe for swimming, so I put on my suit and ran into the surf for my morning bath. While I was happy to have done it, I wouldn’t be keen on trying again… The water was COLD. So cold in fact, that the soap wouldn’t lather in it, and I had to warm it against my body to get it to work.

After my morning ablutions, I continued my trip around the cape, this day taking time to turn off at almost every small road that headed for the coast. I was rewarded for this by finding many small, secluded bays that looked as if they’d been unvisited for months or even years. For all I know, maybe they were.

As the day continued, I took the 20km side trip off the main road to the East Cape itself, the easternmost point on mainland New Zealand. Despite its even more isolated location, the East Cape didn’t feel quite as desolate as Cape Reinga but it did, nonetheless afford some lovely views out over East Island and on out into the far reaches of the South Pacific.

After the cape proper, human habitation picks up a bit, and while the towns were still small they were more frequent. Thus, in place of side trips to tiny isolated bays, my afternoon saw me taking side trips to tiny, isolated towns, located on (not always tiny) isolated bays.

My favourite of these was probably Waipiro Bay. Formerly a prosperous port town, its population has plummeted over the years, but it still bears the landmarks of its former self, including disused buildings of many types, a beautiful old church and three historical Marae.

Carrying along the coastal road, I came to Tolaga Bay, a settlement of some size. Tolaga Bay is known for the spectacular sandstone cliffs at its edges, as well as it’s very long (660m all told) wharf.

I’d actually planned on spending 2.5 days on the East Cape, but by sundown I found myself at Gisborne, a large town at its south-western end. After sunset, I drove about another 80km past Gisborne to the town of Wairoa, where I planned to spend the night. Unfortunately I couldn’t find any of the three hostels in my books, and the only place I could see to stay was a sketchy looking hotel above a tavern.

Thus it was that I made the decision to head north towards Te Urewera National Park, where I could spend another night in the car in a nice rural setting and could also spend the extra day I’d gained by traversing the East Cape faster than planned.

Driving through what looked to be huge sandstone cliffs, or perhaps even sand dunes, I eventually pulled into a turnout by a river where I spent the night.

Once again, I was wakened by the sunrise and found myself in yet another beautiful place. My resting spot turned out to be in a hilly area (the roadside slopes were sandstone rather than sand as it turned out) with cattle and sheep grazing peacefully nearby (I’ll forgive anyone if they can’t resist making smart-aleck comment that this describes pretty much the entire country.)

Another forty minutes of driving produced some wonderful early morning views out over lake Waikaremoana and led me to the park visitor’s centre. At the centre, I asked about the possibility of walks in the area, and it was suggested that given my available time (5-7 hours) I should either walk up to the first of the huts on the Waikaremoana Track Great Walk, or do the whole of the smaller (5-6 hour) Ruapani Circuit. I opted for the latter and was pleased to find that I had company in the form of two sisters from Munich, Germany (Katrin and Kirsten) who were heading out onto the trail at the same time as me.

The Ruapani Circuit begins with a steep climb up through dense temperate forest, passing numerous small wetlands before reaching Lake Ruapani itself, whose shoreline the trail follows for the last 1.5 hours of its length. In fact, the trail wasn’t that dissimilar from what one might find in parts of Ontario.

The beech forest, while lacking the huge Kauris of the northland woods, was nonetheless impressive. Ferns, mosses and fungi abounded, along with the large red beech and smaller white beech trees (these latter actually look a lot like birches.) The trail wasn’t terribly difficult, but it was quite muddy in spots, and the path was often blocked by fallen trees that made walking much more difficult. Aside from making navigation tougher, the dead trees played host to huge numbers of other plants. Perhaps the most illustrative example of how fertile they were was a group of with tiny mushrooms growing on top of a large lichen which in turn is surrounded by moss, all growing on the remains of a red beech.

At the conclusion of the walk, it was time to start the drive to Napier, my stop for the next evening. Napier is a fascinating town, primarily for its architecture. Located right in the middle of Hawke Bay, it was near the epicentre of 7.8 Richter earthquake in 1931, which, along with the resulting fires, destroyed virtually all of the town’s business district. Despite being in the middle of the Great Depression, Napier’s residents still managed to rebuild pretty much the entire downtown in less than two years. This of course means that almost all of the buildings in the centre of town are in styles popular in 1932 and ’33: Spanish Mission (modelled after Spanish Mission houses in California and Mexico) and Art Deco, or some combination thereof. Thus it is Napier has been called “The world’s most Art Deco city.”

I arrived in Napier just before sundown, and despite dome difficulties finding it, made my way to the hostel there in time to enjoy the free beer provided to each guest between 7:00 and 8:00pm.

The following morning began with a walking tour of the business district to see absorb the architecture. While it’s not possible to get the full impact of the place without seeing a full streetscape of Art Deco and Spanish Mission style buildings, some of the individual buildings are still interesting in their own right. This interestingness extends to the hostel I was staying at, the Criterion. Formerly a large hotel, it was constructed at the same time as the whole rest of the town, which certainly makes it the most architecturally interesting hostel I’ve ever stayed in.

My afternoon in Napier was occupied with one of may favourite New Zealand pastimes: watching rugby. I headed out to McLean Park (an easy walk from town) to watch the Hawke’s Bay Magpies take on Manawatu in a National Provincial Championship division 2 match.

I caught the second half of their ‘B’ sides playing and this actually resembled rugby as I know it back in Canada. The two teams were probably not too far removed from ORU ‘A’ standard back home. The ‘A’ sides, or one of them at least, was another matter entirely. Hawke’s Bay has been the perennial NPC division 2 champion, and has won 37 of these matches in a row now, having not lost a game at this level in over four years. Unfortunately, they’ve also lost every one of the matches that would gain them promotion to the first division over this time as well. All of this was explained to me by a kiwi man, there with his brother, daughter, niece and nephew for a family outing. So entertaining was chatting with him that I almost lost track of the game. After the match he explained that he’d be happy to have me sleep at their place, save for the fact that they weren’t headed home after the game. For this reason especially, it grieves me that I never even found out his name (though I did manage to get that his very playful and friendly daughter was named Tabitha.)

After the game, I took one more quick walk around the town to rid myself of the vestiges of the four beers I’d had over the past three hours, and then hopped in the car to head for Dannevirk, a town 100km away or about 1/3 of the way to Wellington, my next day’s destination.

I’m not quite sure what to say about the hostel in Dannevirk. In some respects it was quite unpleasant. The fact that it shares a building with long term, low budget housing makes the staff seem quite paranoid about theft, to the point that all of the dishes and pots for the backpackers’ section are locked up in a separate room. In addition to this, the building, formerly housing for the staff at a now closed hospital was a bit dingy, while still being interesting. Despite these faults, it still had spectacularly friendly staff, cable TV, private rooms and very comfortable beds.

After spending my night in this mixed bag, I headed on through Dannevirk (a town originally settled by Norwegians that is quite proud of its Scandinavian heritage) and down SH2 to Wellington. The drive was pleasant enough, with good weather most of the way. The only three things worthy of note were a series of wind turbines on a hill overlooking the city of Palmerston North, a brief but nasty hail storm I passed through, and the second kiwi crossing sign I’ve seen since arriving in NZ. Since they seem to be fairly rare and everyone seems to come home with a photo of one, I decided I had to stop for a picture too.

After three hours of driving, with several stops along the way, I eventually arrived in Wellington, New Zealand’s second largest city and capital. I dropped off my rental car in the suburb of Lower Hutt. A half hour bus ride and some difficult navigation around downtown later, I found myself at the home of Chris, half of a couple I’d met in Fiji who very kindly offered to put me up if I was ever in Wellington. I was rather later than I’d said I would be when I’d written him a few days earlier, but I was nonetheless welcomed into Chris’ flat immediately upon arrival.

Since this was Sunday afternoon, and likely the only time he’d get to play host, we headed up to the top of Mount Victoria to admire the view over Wellington and so he could give me the lay of the land.

After the invigorating walk up and back down, we met Waverly, the second half of my hosting couple for a quick drink at an Irish pub before heading back to Chris’ to turn in for the evening. Chris shares his flat with an incredible six others, but there’s more than enough room for all. It occupies the whole first floor of his building, and was formerly a cafeteria for workers in a factory next door. This gives it a superb big open living space, along with bedrooms for all and a great kitchen behind a bar-like structure. It was an wonderfully comfortable place to spend a night.

The next morning (Monday), I woke and booked my ticket on the ferry across to the South Island for 09:30 Tuesday, then headed out to explore the City of Wellington.

My first stop was Te Papa, New Zealand’s national museum. And what a museum it is. It’s large, but not huge in size, and does a wonderful job of encapsulating almost every aspect of the country in its five floors. The first floor covers New Zealand’s natural history, including its very active geology, as well as its flora and fauna, with emphasis on the many species endemic to the islands, and the plight of these species in the face of introduced competitors. The third floor houses temporary exhibits (the one on now deals with the early exploration of Antarctica.) The third floor explores the people of New Zealand, with large sections devoted to the history of the Maori and the history of relations between the Maori and Europeans. This floor also contains exhibits dealing individually with each of the major immigrant communities that make up the New Zealand of today. The fourth and fifth floors house collections of New Zealand art, ranging from items dating back to before the country’s founding to contemporary pieces. Sadly, no photography was permitted inside the museum, so I can’t show you any pictures of this amazing place.

After Te Papa, I took the opportunity to admire the building from the outside, and to pop next door to the Wellington Brewing Company. Here I had what are unquestionably the best beers I’ve tried since leaving Toronto. The brewpubs I’d been to in Auckland were okay, but nothing special, as were the major New Zealand brews, but the WBC redeemed the country beer wise in one fell swoop. Particularly good was their Sassy Red Best Bitter.

After my beer tasting, I headed up the street to the Wellington Civic Square. This place confirmed what I was already beginning to suspect: I really like Wellington. I think in my one day here, I’ve already added it to the relatively short list of cities in the world where I’d be happy living. The Civic Centre impressed me both with its appearance and its contents. The central library inside was incredibly well stocked with books and A/V materials of all kinds, not to mention a great smelling cafeteria-restaurant. The outside was a really neat blend of architectural styles. Often this blending of old and new, traditional and modern works very poorly. Not so, here. The buildings all complement one another and make a wonderful focal point for the city.

After leaving the Civic Centre, I made my way to another place where old and new architecture also sit side by side, though this time with not as much success: New Zealand’s parliament buildings. The 19th century legislative house and parliamentary library are lovely. The executive offices right next door housed in “the beehive” (so named because it’s shaped like one) are less-so, but are still intriguing. The three of them together could at best be described as… well… interesting.

I didn’t get to see the inside of the beehive, since it’s a very high security area, but did manage a tour of the other two buildings. The tour guide was very very knowledgeable about not only his own parliament, but of others around the world. To the point of being able to draw parallels between the 1908 fire in New Zealand’s parliament and the 1912 fire in Canada’s, as well as between many other features of the Canadian, Australian and New Zealand parliamentary systems (I’m sure he could have done the same for the British system, but there were no Brits present on the tour.) The buildings generally looked quite similar to Canada’s House of Commons, if a bit smaller (New Zealand has only 120 MPs, and virtually all of their offices are housed in other buildings.) One interesting feature was the modification work that was done in 1992. Structural upgrades were made to allow it to withstand earthquakes, and a new atrium area was added which, while clearly different from the gothic style of the rest of the building, still fit very nicely.

Sadly, parliament was another place in Wellington where photography was not permitted, but I did manage to sneak a picture in one secluded part of the building.

After parliament, my day was winding down, but I did still manage a quick jaunt up to the main park in the Wellington, which houses the botanical gardens, as well as the top terminal for the city’s well known cable car. A quick ride down on the cable car later, and I found myself here, in an internet cafe not far from Chris’ flat.

With the end of this day, so ends my journey on the North Island. Tomorrow morning I head up to the wharf to catch a ferry to Picton, the gateway to the South Island. Everyone always says that the South is the more attractive of the two islands. I can only hope!

In the meantime, I take my leave of you, and also thank Chris and Waverly (as well as all of Chris’ flatmates) once more for being such kind hosts, especially given that I hadn’t even met them three weeks ago!

Talk to you all again from the South Island!

Tags: New Zealand

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