After a night camping in a Picton layby - yes we are that broke and that classy, we caught the ferry (with no breaking down this time) to Wellington. To say we slept the whole way would be an accurate statement! We then took the foretold less scenic route back up to Rotorua to take advantage of our free Polynesian Spa voucher :-). Route 1, which we were told was the quickest but not the prettiest route turned out to be amazing. We saw the valley that was used for Mordor and the setiing for Mt Doom in Lordof The Rings - Dave was very happy - and had a little geek out! But the scenery was amazing - Volcanoes and mountains onesideand forest and Valleys the other - a really great drive.
Anyhow we made it back up to Rotorus by around 6pm, and our visit to the Polynesian Spa was good but really we had already had 3-4 hot springs experiences this trip and it wasn't overly special. The 4 rock pools ranged from 36 degrees to 42 degrees and the facilities were pretty good. From here we headed out of town and found a nice picnic spot by a lake in the middle of the forest where we camped overnight - we were the only campervan there it was a little erie as it was so quiet.
Tobe honest the best part of today was not spending any money on the camping, and seeig the sensational views of the Togariro Crossing and Mt Doom Volcano