Left rotorua today and headed for Whakatane, where we were doing a day trip to White Island. White Island is New Zealands only active marine volcano. Jeez oh I was a little bit scared going onto a real volcano! We got on boat and made our way there, which took about 80 minutes. On the way over we had some soup and got some history on the island. Oh and we also saw a hump back whale! The guides had spotted it so the boat went right over to it, it was awesome! it came up a few times so got some photos. was good to see it in it's natural habitat! Got to white island and had to get kitted out with our gas masks and helmets, which we had to wear at all times! Got a wee safety briefing where the guy told us where to go if there was an eruption! Ahhhh! The island was pretty cool and the guide was so interesting. He took us to the different spots where we saw roaring fumaroles, glittering crystals, bubbling pits of mud and hot thermal streams ( yip I totally did copy the last bit from a leaflet as I'd forgot what we seen lol! ) there had been an eruption in the 70s which had caused a massive lake which was steaming. It was good to see but the sulphur was stinking, had to put on our gas masks to walk through that bit! There was a few sulphur factories over there in the 1930s so we saw the remains of that, and the guide told us some stories about the men that worked there. There was an explosion which killed all of them, the only thing that survived was peter the cat! The tour around the island lasted about 2 hours then got back on boat and had some lunch! almost saw a whale on way back but it didnt come up after the guides saw it. We made our way back to whakatane and got campervan. Drove to mount maunganui and got there about 6pm. We managed to get a campsite just in front on the mount and across from the beach, which was pretty awesome! So we decide to walk up the mount, jeez it was tiring! Got to top for some good photos then the boys decided to run down. We definetely need to do some exercise with all the dining we've been doing but I just decided walking was enough exercise for me! Went for a chinese after and then back to campsite. Great day, really enjoyed white island tour as was something a bit different!