Day 1. Auckland to Rotorua

We got away at 5am as scheduled and headed south on a clear morning.
I wont bore you with the route we took, but needless to say it wasn’t the normal one.
We stopped after about 1 1/2 hrs and had a snooze before breakfast, then onto Matamata and a quaint little town called Tirau where virtually every shop was either a cafe or a tourist knick knack shop. They didn’t get any $s from us.
From there it was onto Lake Rotorua where we stopped for an early lunch and another snooze before heading for the white water rafting place. Norma couldn’t wait, I could tell because she wasn’t saying much :))
If you haven’t ever done some serious white water rafting you really should have a go. This one was once classified as a stage 6 but is now a stage 5. It has a 7mtr drop, and as you can see from the photoes you get seriously under water – well we did anyway.
A huge amount of fun, and Norma thoroughly enjoyed it; hasn’t stopped talking about it. Cost was NZ$220 with the photoes which will be one of our only big tourist expenditures unless I can get Norma roped into a bungy jump ::))
From there we went into Rotorua before driving south to a little place called Reporoa where we stopped for the night at what is called a ‘Park Over Property’. These are dotted all over NZ and are homes of people who have an interest in Motorhoming. Anyone who belongs to the NZ Motor Caravaning Assoc can park their motorhome in the people’s yard for about $5 for the night or less.
Had a quiet night.

CYa

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