Rotorua

We got back from Rotorua (nicknamed Roto-Vegas and Sulphur City) last night, after quite a long ride in the car. No offense to Rotorua, but I'm not sure how soon I'll be heading back there. It's a great place to go if you have a lot of money to spend, because everything there costs money to do! Ok, not everything, but most everything. And it smells like sulphur, which did not agree with me. I am glad I finally got to go though! I have never been to Yellowstone park in the states, so it was cool for me to see all these weird geothermal things going on.

This is the Pohutu Geyser located in Whakarewarewa geothermal reserve.  We got to see it erupting, but I didn't get a very good photo of that.  The orange and yellow colors are from the sulphur in the water as it runs down.

This photo may not look like anything spectacular, but I could not stop staring at it!  It's a boiling mud pool.  So weird.  It makes me wonder what God was thinking when he made all these strange things.  

This is just another area that had steam vents coming up from the ground.  It was nice and warm and of course smelled awful!

Steam from the geyser as the sun was setting.  

We ate dinner at the Fat Dog after visiting the geothermal area and seeing a Maori show.  We were so tired we were barely able to talk during dinner.  I ordered a pasta dish and Sophia really liked the noodles and just kept eating them and eating them!  I think she almost swallowed them whole, but they seemed to slide right down the hatch.  She ate them twice the next day as well.  The Fat Dog had funny poems written along the walls and it was very colorful inside.  I guess I should have snapped a photo of that!  Oh well.  More Rotorua photos to follow...