We went to a great Maori cultural night which was far from the gimmick I expected it to be.Reuben was appointed chief of our group (ok, he volunteered, egged on by me) - which meant that when we entered the village, he had to make a speech to the Maori chiefletting him know we came in peace.It was bloody intimidating actually, they arrived by torch lit canoe and demonstrated some of their warrior moves in their native dress and tattoos, and stared Reuben down.After listening to his speech he accepted us in and we were allowed to join them for the evening.The cool thing about Reuben being the Chief and me the Chieftess was that we led the pack, got to sit at the front and see everything first.This didn't extend to the Hangi (Maori feast) where we had to wait in the queue with the rest of the peasants.Humph. It was great to learn about the culture and traditions, and because it was all at night it added that edge of authenticity to it too. It was really fun.

On our way out of Rotorua I fulfilled my vow to myself and went zorbing, basically rolling down a hill in a big rubber ball filled with water. It was like a giant slip N slide but enclosed and I couldn't stop laughing at the silliness of it all. Almost everyone there was a grown adult who couldn't wait to get thrown around in a wet ball, it was great! We also stopped to watch some hilarious sheepdog trials (who knew sheep could jump?) beore heading to Lake Taupo .