Rotorua - Mount Manganui - Whitianga

Imagine living in a town which constantly smells of eggy farts.... Well, that's Rotorua.

Rotorua is commonly known amongst non-locals as "Rottenrua" due to the rotting egg-like odour of the Hydrogen Sulphide gas produce by the prolific geothermal activity. The odour is most noticeable on cooler and rainy days,especially when there is low cloud, although most locals are immune to it and are usually unaware of its presence.

The especially pungent smell in the central-east 'Te Ngae' area is due to the dense sulphur deposits located next to the southern boundary of the Government Gardens, in the area known as 'Sulphur Point'.

How anyone can be immune to such a smell I have no idea. The place stinks and we stayed 3 whole days!!!

A lot of time was spent at the Polynesian Spa, soaking in hot mineral pools and generally being lazy. And we went to the cinema and.....

Well, it was a nice relaxing 3 days!

We then went off up to Mount Manganui for a quick 1 night stop. A nice little seaside town with a mountain at the end of the main street. Well, they call it a mountain but we thought Mound Manganui was more appropriate. Probably the smallest "mountain" we have ever seen.

We stayed in a nice little hostel and met some lovely people.

Next day we went off to Whitianga. We stopped off at Hot Water Beach along the way where we dug a hole in the sand and all this hot water bubbles up and fills the pool and then you just get in and relax. Your own mini beach spa pool.

From Whitianga we were meant to go to Thames and stay there for 2 nights but our lovely bus driver Lisa said it was very dull so we came back to Auckland.

So here we are. We had a night out on Sunday with some of the tour bus drivers and some other travellers and rocked in about 6am. A quiet night!

Next stop Fiji - don't be exciting anything more for a while. We will mostly be spending the next 2 weeks lying on a beach catching some rays.