November 19th - Day 11 - Oh Natural...

Our next stop would be the Waitomo Caves in Otorohanga but because it was only about 2 hours away we thought we would spend the morning exploring a bit more in Rotorua.  I Googled "Free Rotorua" and found that there are natural crystal clear springs about 20 minutes away (by car) which would fill our morning perfectly.  It was a bit tricky to find, not very well marked and not very touristy yet as they are in the process of rebuilding the area for tourism.  It worked out in our favor; only a few other people on our path.  Hamurana Spring!  Breathtakingly beautiful, crystal clear icy blue water with hues of turquoise, green and blue.  About 4 different varieties of ducks greeted us upon the entrance of the springs, which happens to be a bridge so Ryan took a few pictures of them and they eventually moved out of the way.
 



The deepest natural fresh water spring on the North Island; 920 feet (280 m) above sea level and is approximately 15 meters (50 ft) deep. It produces an estimated 4 million liters of crystal clear water per hour at a constant temperature of 10 degrees Celsius. The rock surrounding this spring is volcanic and the spring water travels down through underground aquifers, taking 70 years to get there.  The water coming out of this spring everyday is enough to fill 2 Olympic sized swimming pools.
   

Looking down into the spring itself, the volcanic sides are made up of ledges with lots of nooks and crannies. We read that people throw coins into the spring to watch them "dance" on the up-current as they sink, so we looked down and saw many of the coins resting on some of the ledges.    Well... when in Rome...  we both dropped a coin in to watch it dance.  Very cool!   :)

About 50 years ago, pioneer divers from Wellington recovered 5000+ pennies from the spring which were donated to local children's charities.

Next on the walk was a small area called Dancing Sands where the sand on the bottom literally looks like it's dancing and hopping about because the effect of the emerging water on the bottom of the spring.  It was too hard to capture a pic of it but glad we stopped by there.
Just as we were about to make our way around the loop back to JCDV, we heard a loud clap of thunder that sounded like it was right above our heads.  This sure put a hop in our step because it immediately began to down pour.  Not prepared for rain, we ran as quickly as we could the last the 400 meters back.  We were soaked by the time we got in the van.  It was really coming down hard with thunder and lightening so so we figured it best we be on our way.

The drive to Otorohanga was only a few hours but the storms followed with their dark grey ominous clouds surrounding us.  We had the odd break every half hour or so but it didn't let up until we arrived.  We've driven through many smaller towns but we hadn't stayed in a super small town.  Otorohanga itself only has about 2600 people.  Yep, you blink and you've missed it but even though it's a small town, the people here seem to be not that unlike vancouverites. 


Found a decent place to stay, which was very basic (bed, sheets, electrical outlets...) communal kitchen, fridge, toilets and shower but it suited our needs just fine. 






We had booked The Legendary Black Water Rafting "Black Abyss" tour for ourselves and Alain for tomorrow but we knew there was more exploring to be done this evening.  Got out our touristy map and that lead us to the Mangapohue Natural Bridge.  This was cool but on the way there we saw these huge birds on a farm...like really big.  They were Ostrich.  This was the funniest part of our trip so far.  As soon as we parked the car on the side of the road, this male Ostrich makes a b-line for us.  At this point Ryan is already out of the van and attempting to get his camera via the side door.  He turns around and sees the Ostrich.  He's scared shitless and repeats over and over again, "that's a big bird, that's a big bird" while climbing in the side door of the van, ready to close it at any moment. 
It stayed with us for a while, luckily on the other side of the fence but Ryan was happy to stay in the van!  Seriously LMAO!!!!!
Btw, we also saw Emu's.  Cool!  


We did eventually make it to the Natural Bridge after about 30 minutes on a beautiful, curvy, lush, vibrantly green road.  


The 17 m high limestone arch, which spans the Mangapohue Stream, is all that remains of an ancient cave system. The track is stepped and passes under the bridge giving a view of the ceiling studded with stalactite-like formations and an excellent view back down the gorge.

      




Saw some potential photo ops on the way there and made a note to stop on the way back.  We weren't sure what this was at first but upon closer evaluation from a distance, they look to be bee farms of some kind.  We could see the bees flying around the bottom of the stacks.  Since then we've seen many on our travels through NZ so far.



 

Not sure what these represented either but it was picture worthy!   Shoes, boots and a flipper all lined up on the fence. Probably about 30 or so...








Home for groceries and dinner which we bbq'd.  (Honey mint marinated lamb chops with,salad)


G & Sunshine, our chips of choice for tonight were "Burger Rings" (supposed to taste like a burger but we both agreed they were not worth buying and would be ok if we never ate them again) and Feta Garlic corn chips with poppy seeds.  (These were decent!)