“This is one city where we can fart with impunity,” I said to Davey.
The pungent smell of Rotorua, caused by hydrogen sulphide emissions, is stronger when you’re close to the lakes and thermal springs. After two hours of walking in the town centre, however, we noticed that our perception of the sulphuric smell had faded. Isn’t it a bonus that dark adaptation made us perceive the glow worms better, yet sensory adaptation caused us to notice the eggy smell less?
Rotorua is a world-renowned wellness centre, offering every conceivable type of spa, therapy, massage and treatment for those who seek inner peace, supple muscles and protective antioxidants. You can bathe in hot mineral springs, be wrapped in mud, enjoy a Manuka honey massage, and plunge afterwards into a cold, refreshing waterfall. There are even various types of mud, evidently, and each one provides the supposed health benefits of geothermal energy. The treatments may sound rather far-fetched, yet people pay around $300 an hour for some of them.
We resisted them all.
Instead, we visited the Waimangu Volcanic Valley, which became the simmering, steaming, breathtaking landscape that it now is after the eruption of Mount Tarawera in 1886. As you walk along the valley, everything seems to be in a ceaseless state of creation and re-creation: the pools bubble; the geysers spout boiling water into the air; mists hang over the lakes and rise over the mountains. It is like being in a primordial swamp, yet with welcome modern elements such as a coffee shop and shuttle bus.
Waimangu is the world’s youngest geothermal ecosystem and it felt both soothing and invigorating to be there almost at the beginning, watching a new world being formed.
In such a magical place, who needs mud?
Love from Rosi 🖤🤍
Extra Details
- An Informative and Inspiring Tour: Mitai Māori Village
On the evening before our visit to Waimangu, we were welcomed to a hāngī feast, watched a special performance showing the athletic, fighting and dancing skills of the Māori, and learned more about Māori traditions and language.
The leader of the tour explained that new words in Māori are often created through combinations of already existing words: for instance, the word for computer is “rorohiko“, with “roro” meaning “brain” and “hiko” meaning “flash” or “electric”.
