North again

Carrying on from where I left off. Palmerston North turned out to be a pointless diversion as the whole sheep farming thing didn't come about. Anyway I returned to A plus lodge in Turangi only to be kicked out for getting food poisoning. Yes that actually happened. Ian's ex wife/girlfriend/whatever who for some reason is in charge said I couldn't stay because I might
infect everyone else in the hostel and I hadn't done any work which was true as I was a bit too dehydrated to do anything. While appalled by this woman's small minded stupidity I was glad to finally be leaving. The next day I was back on the bus on the way to Auckland.

Auckland was fully booked until Monday due to an event on some sort at the weekend. So I decided to spend some time back in Rotorua. I was staying in the hobbit hole wing of funky green voyager.

Having already seen most of the attractions I haven't actually done that much. But then most isn't the same as all. I wanted to go to the lakes to the south of Rotorua as the weather was perfect for swimming. There isn't really a public transport option for these lakes and the shuttle buses only take you to paid attractions. So I decided as they were only 11km away I'd run down. Now this run turned out to mostly be walking but it worked out well.

I arrived at the Blue lake to find it had jet skis on it which kind of ruined the whole get back to nature thing I had in mind. So I went further to lake Tarawera which was much more isolated. It had a four hour walking track to hot water beach which I couldn't resist doing even if it meant getting back very late. Almost immediately I came to the conclusion this was a splendid idea regardless of the
consequences. The Tarawera trail has stunning views and takes you through the fern filled rainforest which gives New Zealand its appeal. The water was perfect for swimming in and it was delightfully isolated.
I'd had visions of spending the night bathing in warm water at hot water beach. It didn't exactly work out like that because the water at hot water beach actually is hot. The hot water flows into the lake creating a scalding hot layer of water on the surface while underneath the is water normal lake temperature. There is fun to be had with this and it is spectacular but not one for bathing in all night.
I then raced back to the car park at the start of the track and got there just in time as it was getting dark. Surprisingly there were still cars on the road and I was able to get a lift back from Ike who was returning from an engagement party.