Rotoroua is one of New Zealands centres of geothermal activity with steam comming out from the ground in alot of places. It stinks of rotten eggs and sulphur. Many houses and buildings including the hospital use the geothermal vents underground to supply their annual heating needs, very impressive!! We had a great time in Rotoroua and had the opportunity to go to the Tamaki Heritage night in a Maori village. It was brilliant, they were dressed up in their traditional tribal gear and had weapons too. When we first arrived they were really intimidating but eventually welcomed us intio their village and allowed us to feast with them. All the old customs from hundreds of years ago were upheld and it was a very interesting and educational experience.

The dinner was all cooked in the old fashoned way aswell, wrap the food up and bury it in the ground for a few hours untill its done, it was one of the best meals we had since leaving ireland! The Maori people themselves gave us a brief history of their people and finished off the night by performing the Haka - Im sure you've seen it before a rugby match whenever the kiwi's play, it was really intense and very aggresive. Everyone had a great time..

We went to the Aquadome activty park on the outskirts of town and got to go Zorbing and Luging :) Both were great crack. In the Zorb you jump into a bubble and roll downhill with a load of water chucked in, its the closest you can possible come to experiencing what a washing machine feels like, but was well worth it!!

The Luge was also pretty cool, you get to sit on a board with handle bars and go speeding down the mountain on a series of race tracks, it was over really quickly but excellent fun. On the way back to town we checked out the local park. There are tonnes of geothermal lakes in this park where the water is just bubbling away and steam drifting off the pools. It absolutely stank!!