April 19 - 22

You can't help but know exactly when you've reached Rotorua, you smell it a long time before you see it! The town's proximity to the geothermal valley and it's sulphur deposits mean that depending on which way the wind is blowing and how much rain there's been you get a town which either smells a bit like egg or a town that smells like someone took a giant egg mayo sandwich and hid it under a fat guy in a sauna for a couple of days...putrid.

As it was a tuesday, we couldn't resist stopping at Dominos for a cheap lunch os we grabbed our pizza and sat down by the lake. For the remainder of the day we wandered around town for a while and headed to our campsite for the night. Day 2 in Rotorua and we made our way to the Agrodome, home of the famous sheep show. Before the thrills and spills of the farmyard fun we crossed the road to roll down a hill in a giant inflatable ball! Zorbing was invented here in Rotorua and has since gone global, it's easy to see why, it's damn good fun! You get taken up in a 4x4 to the top of the hill where a giant ball is filled with warm water and you are squeezed in through a small hole. We opted to go for a duo run so both sat inside the same ball in our swimwear as it was pushed through a gate and down the side of the hill - It felt like what I imagine it's like being inside a washing machine! When we got to the bottom of the hill, we had to slide out of the cosy warm ball covered in water into the cold field like some kind of weird birth re-enactment!

Once we'd dried ourselves off we took our seats in the Agrodome amongst the hoards of Asians and their camera's as the farm dude (I don't know what his title is) brought on the stars of the show - 19 sheep from all over the world, each more crazy looking than the last. Honestly, you think you've seen a sheep, that you know what a sheep looks like, then one rocks up with dreadlocks! There was a shearing demonstration and some kids got to feed some lambs and then they brought out a cow and asks for volunteers to milk it, so of course Janine whipped her arm up and got called on stage to milk it. Bless her, she even got a little certificate! For the finale they brought out they sheep-dogs who herded some ducks and generally went around like they owned the place, jumping on the sheep and barking a lot, brilliant! After the Agrodome we stopped at Agoventures to watch some people bungy jumping and racing around on a speedboat. That night we went into town for a couple of drinks and ended up watching a band in a place called the Pheasant Plucker, good day!

For our second day in Eggyville we went to Te Puia, the most celebrated and least 'tacky' of all of New Zeland's Maori Cultural experiences. Rotorua is full of places offering a 'traditional Maori experience' and quite often this translates into a building next to a Pizza Hut where they paint your face, dress you up and some unenthusiastic people try to teach you the Haka. We wanted to avoid this, so went to Te Puia, which is more a living Maori village with a cultural centre built around it. All the guides are Maori descendants of the local tribe that called Rotorua home and the entrance fee also includes a walk down through the valley to New Zealands largest active Geyser. When we first arrived we were treated to a show by the local Maori men and women consisting of singing, dancing and examples of some of the war displays such as the Haka - popularised by the All Black NZ Rugby team. The displays are awesome, involving a lot of crazy, angry facial expressions and tongue-wagging all designed to intimidate the opposition. The Maori were a race that were pretty decent fighters, honing their skills through violent inter-tribal wars and notably scoring many victories against the European settlers and it's easy to see why - apparently the tongue wagging is a way of displaying how much you look forward to tasting the flesh of your foe!

After the show we were taken on a guided tour of the site by a Maori lady who was herself a descendant of the tribe that populate the region. We were shown around reconstructions of traditional villages and stopped by at the wood-carving and weaving schools before ending up at the Kiwi House to catch a glimpse of the New Zealand icon in the flesh. The bird is notoriously difficult to see in the wild, being nocturnal and sleeping up to 20 hours a day, but here they've built a habitat that is kept dark during the day and light at night and we got to see the funny little bird waddling around. It's bigger than you'd expect, almost the size of a chicken but very round and almost podgy looking with no wings and a long thin beak. It's never gonna win any beauty awards, but it is hilarious to watch! The tour finished at the Geyser, which erupts a couple of times an hour and we were just in time to see it spewing smelly water 30 feet into the air. Te Puia is a really cool place, with care taken to remain authentic and respectful to Maori culture, and it enforced both our opinions that the Maori culture is one of the most interesting and rich of all the various 'native' cultures we've seen on this trip.

Once we'd finished at Te Puia, we drove into town to wander around a night market that was set up in the streets of Rotorua for the Easter Holiday. It was full of local produce and had plenty of tasters, always popular with us backpackers!