Hot in Here

I'm tired. Physically, mentally, and any other way that you can get absolutely beat out, sign me up. It's been twenty five weeks, getting back to this point, and every ounce of my being is preparing to run on auxiliary power to carry me through the final push. Stay with me on this one, I plan on seeing it through to the bittersweet end.

The sun was bright and shining the last day I spent in Napier – shorts weather, as far as I was concerned. That didn't exactly hold for the day I left, with frost still clinging to the grass in those little dips off the side of the road that the shadows haven't been breached yet.

Gary brought me as far as Eskdale, just outside of Napier and at the start of the Thermal Explorer Highway, where he works as a teacher. I stood by the side of the road, but lucked into a ride heading to Taupo within a few minutes. The broad boxer/biker/chef was heading back home to Hamilton, the window rolled down just enough to let little icicles form between my toes. The sun was on the lake though, and by mid-morning, after I'd checked into Base, it was turning into a pretty decent day.

Lake Taupo is the biggest lake in New Zealand – 616 square kilometres, running 46 km from the small town of Taupo to Turangi and the foothills of Mt. Tongariro. The mountains in the distance looked pretty docile this morning, covered with snow, but they've got a steady rumbling deep in their bellies. This spot is, after all, the bottom of the Taupo Volcanic Zone, one of the most active geothermal spots on the planet, stretching all the way up to White Island in the Bay of Plenty (Lake Taupo is nothing more than a flooded caldera after all, land that collapsed from a massive volcanic eruption). If you remember from when this whole misadventure Down Under started, White Island was smoking and I had to do a disjointed version of the Tongariro Crossing precisely because the eponymous volcano had blown its top recently (the full crossing re-opened in April).

By virtue of sitting over a constantly aggravated strip of hot land, there are lots of cool things to see. And by cool, I obviously mean the opposite – parts of this countryside are literally steaming all the time, especially as you head towards Rotorua, an hours drive north of Taupo. For the time being, I followed the longest river in the country, the Waikato River, up from Lake Taupo, until I got to the cascading Huka Falls. The wide river started out slow and lazy, but after a few bends and dips, it built up some serious momentum.

By the time the Waikato made it to Huka Falls though, gushing through an abruptly narrowing rocky corridor, it was pushing forward at a steady rate of 220,000 litres a second. That's approximately a metric shittonne of water, frothing and bubbling in a hypnotic, milky blue assault that generates nearly half of the power for the North Island.

The path back from Huka Falls to Taupo goes through the forest lining the river, until it emerges in an open field, broken by a smaller river dumping into the Waikato. It was a warm afternoon by now, but not quite warm enough for swimming – still, there were a few brave souls splashing around. Hmm, I thought, they build them tough in Taupo.

Until I saw the steam drifting off the stream surface. Spa Park in the Taupo Volcanic Zone is what you'd call aptly named. I dipped my toes in the slight current – just like a bath. A sandy, flowing bath. I didn't have a towel, didn't have a change of clothes . . . but it was like when Bart is running out of Mr. Burns' underground vampire lair and finds the lever for the Super Happy Fun Slide: “I know I really shouldn't, but when am I going to be here again?”

Screw it, my skivvies could dry in my jeans. It was a decent day, after all, and it's not every day you stumble upon a hidden little thermal pool. After a soak, I continued on my way, passing the Taupo Bungy over the Waikato. The jumping platform is 47 m high, and even though the Nevis is more than twice that, I was glad I'd already done my jump and could just line up along the viewing platform and watch these crazies take their big leap of faith.

After a dinner of cheap tacos from the hostel bar, myself and Judith, the German girl sharing a dorm room with me, went out for a few drinks, to check out the Taupo nightlife on a Tuesday evening in the winter. There was a crowd dressed up in full costume and 80s pop blasting from the stereos at Element Bar, but a relatively quiet night just the same.

Come the morning, I packed my gear together and got ready to hit the road to Rotorua, the real hotspot of this area. I also made the faux pas I swore I'd never be stupid enough to make – lugging all my gear down the road, just outside the main hub of town, I went in the completely wrong direction. The road ahead went to Napier – Rotorua was behind me, once you got back to Taupo and through town. Vexed b'y.

The only thing to do was to try to thumb down a ride, worried that the passing drivers would think I was just going to Taupo and too lazy to walk the few kilometres down the hill. You've only got a few seconds to put on your best smile and coax a lift – you can't very well get a big enough sign to say: “Hey! I'm a moron, and I've already walked for about an hour and I'm sweating and my bag is heavy and I don't want to have to go all the way back to Taupo just to get to the place where I should have started in the first place!”

Thankfully, some guy pulled over and brought me down the road, past Base (again) and up to the top of the hill on the correct outskirt of Taupo. Another little wait, until a Maori truck driver lugging a wrecked Sedan let me hop into the passenger seat.

This is the part of the story that the Moms of the world probably won't love. Shouting over the missing back window, myself and Mark had a great little chat as we cruised down the highway. “Where are you staying?” he asked me. I didn't really know – my plan was just to go to the i-SITE and find the cheapest accommodations for a few nights.

“Well,” he said, “if you're only staying for a few nights, you could always stay in our spare bedroom.”

Rotorua is both the geothermal and Maori core of New Zealand. RotoVegas they call it, because the city is a neon-lit commercial zone that thrives on tourists spending money to see geysers and hakas. I wanted to get a Maori experience that didn't fall into the jurisdiction of a tourist trap, but I mean, it's not like I'd just go stay with this stranger who picked me up off the side of the road with a smoke dangling out of his mouth . . .

Except that that's totally what I did.

What can I tell you about my time with Mark, Heraina, and Pourini, a Maori family in the twenty-first century? There was no time at the marae, no discussion of ceremonial rites and deities. This was an urban family in 2013 – and the issues within were frightening, but an amazingly candid opportunity. A history of domestic violence, police records, family members in jail, drug problems, bitter and violent feuds with brothers and sisters – but an unwavering assurance that life is worth living and enjoying. That even when this life deals you a constant barrage of assault and tragedy, it's ok to be nice to other people – to find some guy by the side of the road and give him a mattress to lay his sleeping bag on.

It would be stereotypical and probably racist to say that this is what a Maori family lifestyle in the city is like these days, but the window afforded to me confirmed that the effect of the urbanization and assimilation of the Native population has had significant consequences that ripple down through the generations. What I, a naive Canadian youngster, would call “normal” was not the kind of thing I saw here – but broadening that definition of normal is something important. The world's too big a place for that word to exist anyway. I heard a lot of things to make my eyes pop out of my head, but believe me when I say that I wasn't uncomfortable or felt unsafe, even when the police showed up this morning looking for information on the whereabouts of one “naughty” daughter.

Alright Mom, you can breathe again. And now that you know I'm ok, you can start figuring out how you're going to kill me for that little foray.

Back to Rotorua, a city of 70,000 that has a Maori history going back to the 14th century. When we were kids, myself and my brother went to some novelty store and found these vials of Stinkbombs. When you cracked the glass, the gas inside would make one nasty smell. This was a great setup for shenanigans – except that the lot of them ended up in the glove compartment of the car when we were on the Marine Atlantic ferry crossing. We got back in the car, waiting in a queue with the rest of the drivers for when the gates opened, put something in the glove box, didn't realize all the vials got wedged in that little crack near the hinges, shut it, and waited, utterly trapped in a congestion of steel and the sudden stench of rotten eggs as the angel of death swiftly descended upon us.

Anyway, that smell was sulphur, the same odour that drifted out of the vents and crevices in the Rotorua area. Apparently you get used to it, but I'd say that every now and then a good gust blows in your face and you suddenly question your own mortality. Whangapiro literally means “evil-smelling place,” and that's the traditional name for the area around the Government Gardens, down by the side of Lake Rotorua. 

Some bubbling pools in the midst of some cool architecture, all wrapped around the elaborate neo-Tudor Bath House that went on to become the Rotorua Museum of Art & History – decent place for a stroll.

The route along the lake continues on to Ohinemutu, a traditional (and still occupied) Maori pa (that's a fortress). It's a small community, complete with residents, a marae, red tiki carvings with paua shell eyes, and the Anglican church of St. Faith's.

I got up bright and early on Thursday morning, packing a lunch and walking back to the highway heading to Taupo (on purpose this time). It took two rides to get to Wai-O-Tapu Geothermal Wonderland – this whole area is a volcanic wonderland, but this cordoned spot with an admission price is a sure-fire way to see the best (and most diverse, colourful stuff) that the area has to offer: hot springs, mud pools, and sulphur craters along a winding pathway. But first, the Lady Knox Geyser.

Back in the day, there was a prison here before a tourist attraction. They knew there was a hot spring here, and it gave the prisoners a logical place to wash their clothes – until the soap they were using caused a chemical reaction that opened up a chamber of pressured steam, and turned the hot water into a vertical eruption some 20 m in the air. They probably got their load of clothes clean but had to wash their own drawers right away.

Nowadays, they add a natural surfactant to the mound (that's how they time the geyser eruption to 10:15 each day, regardless of daylight savings time) and step back. Because when it blows, it blows, for up to an hour. A decent crowd assembled at the small amphitheater to watch some water seriously burst out of the ground by a 100% organic pressure hose.

I happened to meet up with Judith again, and we went through the park together, through the freaky terrain. Not desolate, but hardly habitable either – steam, stench, colours, and heat from the bowels of the earth. Pretty cool.

The centrepiece of the park is the Champagne Pool, a deep hot spring with a green colour, lined by a ring of orange-tinged rocks painted by arsenic. You think about what happens beneath the earth, what's constantly happening and ever changing, and it's pretty amazing.

After crossing a boardwalk that sits directly on the shallow Artist's Palette (so named because the chemicals cause so many different shades), the path goes through some more Mordor-like landscapes before emerging on the expansive Lake Ngakoro, right in sight of (what else?) a geothermal plant.

The final stop on the way back to Rotorua was the constantly bubbling mud pool. Imagine a goopy mess of mud, interspersed with little vents where steam pops out of the earth in regular intervals. What you have is a surprisingly relaxing melody of frothing mud all around you – and what you and I might call dirt is the kind of stuff that local spas are more than happy to lather you up in and charge you a small fortune.

Not that you're going to strip off and jump in here – this is more the watch-don't-touch kind of mud pool. Probably for the best, since no one would take me if I was dripping stinky mud all over their car.

Back in Rotorua, fun time was over. Time for serious business, a farewell that was very near and dear to me. Letting go has never been easy, but I'm not in Tiger Country anymore.

I guess this means I'm about ready to go back to the real world. It's been twenty-five weeks, but here I am, back in a place that's more familiar than anywhere else in New Zealand. “Well,” Jane said as I opened the door in their Tauranga home, “you know where to put your bags. In your room.”

The circle's almost complete. Just stay with me a bit longer.

Cheers,

rb