New Zealand Day Five - May 28th, 2009

Today was meant to be an outdoors day! Planning on enjoying the sun and sand, I finally decided to wear the capris I had packed. We wanted to get an early start, so we headed out and ate our breakfast in the car in the parking lot of a hike we had picked out.

It was freezing outside! I had my hoodie pulled up over my head nearly the whole time and I jogged in place a lot to get my blood flowing again. The hike was only about 7 minutes each way but, like all of New Zealand's sights, it was worth it! There was a cool waterfall, some crazy vines hanging down from the trees, and a tree that grew sideways at its base.

After loading back up in the car we made our way North up to the Bay of Plenty. We passed through Bethlehem on the way... who knew that Bethlehem was really in New Zealand?? There were also pretty Fall colors along the way.

We got lost along the shore for a little bit and ended up at one of the sea ports.

Welcome to Mt. Manganui - volcano. Perfect for more hiking, and filled with spectacular views!! Hiking up...

Nearing the top.

Up on top!

Looking down at the town where we started our hike. We could see surfers hanging out in the water waiting to catch good waves; they're barely visible in the full-size version of this picture.

There were multiple paths up the volcano, so Ash and I explored a different route on the way back down. This path led us through more trees. These are the stairs on the back side of the volcano and an ocean view.

Once we got back to the bottom the path passed right through several large pastures of sheep; each pasture was fenced off, but all the gates didn't have latches - nobody minded that tourists walked through their private property every day.

The beginning of the path we ended on, and looking back at the volcano. It doesn't look so big from this side.

Beach time! Although the air was still fairly cool Ashley and I layed out on the beach for two hours working on our tans. I love the sun in New Zealand! I never once put on sunscreen and I didn't burn at all! That's quite impressive for a white girl like me!

The sand was so beautiful!

Although, it wasn't the kind of sand that would be great for castle making, but it worked great for other things!

We stuck our feet in to discover that the water was FREEZING - and noticed that all of the surfers were wearing wet suits. Ashley and I were probably the only ones wearing a bathing suit on the beach that day.

And of course, we took jumping pictures!

Because of the temperature of the water we started thinking twice about the decision we had made earlier about jumping in the ocean no matter what... but being the crazy Americans we are we had to represent, and so we went screaming (literally) into the ocean. You may not be able to tell, but we were dripping wet here. People were looking at us like we were insane.

Once back in Rotorua for the evening we decided to explore the park across the street from our hostel and found a wonderful thermal pool meant to soak your feet in - a good way to warm up after a cold dip in the ocean! We're eating apples...

The view from my seat at the thermal foot pool.

The whole time I was in New Zealand I had been waiting for the opportunity to go geocaching. My friend Ryan had picked up a geocoin in Las Vegas and asked if I would deposit it in a cache while on my trip. It took FOREVER to fin the cache, but once Ashley found it (smart girl) we were able to examine the contents, sign our names and trade the coin for another.

The coin I left.

Back at the hostel we headed to the kichen and made ourselves a hodge-podge dinner of butter chicken, mashed potatoes, and rolls. Soooo good...

As per our pre-bedtime ritual we played Phase 10. Still playing two hands each to make it more interesting, I won again. Ashley wasn't happy. But it had been a fun day!