Joel and I headed out for 'US' time and hit the trails by ourselves. Something we have been looking forward to for several months.

Wow! What a ride. We hired some full suspension bikes so we could really get into the experience. The shuttle service (to get up the hill and out the back into the really fun stuff) only runs after 1pm during the week and not on a Monday - so it was climbing that had to be done. It was tough!! Bloody tough.
There is a stark difference from the forest with all the ferns and the sheer brutal landscape of a cleared forest.
There is also a massive difference between old school hand cut trails and machine built epic tracks.
The Corners was only open 9 days ago and it was pretty amazing - very firm, massive berms and lots and lots of them. Well worth the climb.

Some of the old school stuff got a bit 'meh' because there was plenty of climbing in the downhill, but still fun but by that stage I was stuffed. The new machine cut stuff was epic but again you wouldn't want to only be doing that - so it was good to mix it up.

I did plenty of pushing the bike, certainly after the climb to the corners cause I was just stuffed and the bike just didn't have enough gears for me to churn thru. Certainly the climb would be a once a month thing and then shuttle at other times ($10 per go).

Tired, b*****ed, happy and very glad we did it and took up most of the four hours that we hired bikes for.

Headed back to the motel to see what the kids had been up to. Not a lot - so it was their turn. We headed up to Skyline - Rotorua's adventure park. After a ride up the hill in a gondola we set off for the luge track. We had five goes rack luge-ING down and chair lifting back up the hill. Caitlyn and Angela quickly advances to the hardest track while Jacob kept to the intermediate track. The girls happily recall how they were doing jumps and getting some air down the course. They have been hanging out together quite a bit - nice to see some sisterly love.

Next activity - the sky swing. After a bit of a wait the kids jumped in first and were strapped in the the swing and were lifted 50m into the air and then with a pull of the cord sent hurtling thru the air reaching 150km/hr and then swinging back to the gate. Caitlyn was charged with pulling the rope and two attempts later she launched herself, Angela and Jacob. The kids loved it!!
Joel and my turn next - Joel loved it, I hated it and spent the next 20mins turning to stop shaking and getting my heart rate back to a reasonable level.

Next stop - Jelly Belly factory. We let the kids buy a few treats and they all had a go at the lucky dip wheel - three spins and the jelly bean that you get could be either nice or yuck. Angie spins resulted in dog food and peach. Caitlyn go rotten eggs and chocolate pudding and Jacob got grass clippings and peach.

Went back to the motel and I de-stressed with a spa bath and wine while the kids enjoyed the geothermal pool.

Never doing the sky swing again!!!!