City of Sails: Mid-Sem Tour, Day VI – Wai-o-tapu and Waimangu, Rotorua

It was a pretty intense day as we visited 2 parks. At first, we planned to only do one, either Wai-o-tapu or Waimangu. We were torn because it was obvious that Yeefang and I had different preference. She was more inclined towards Wai-o-tapu which is a park with the coloured mineral pools and I was for Waimangu which was the less touristy place, closer to nature. I was prepared to accommodate and go to just Wai-o-tapu because I didn’t feel like paying the entrance fee of both parks. Yeefang was quite ready to go for both though. Fortunately, we were informed by the lady from i-site that if we went to both parks, we would get a discount on both the entrance fee and transport (by Dave’s Shuttle) so, we went ahead with both.

Thank God we went for both cos Waimangu was so impressive. The whole place was practically fuming due to the thermal activity. The temperature in the park is significantly higher than outside because both of us were feeling so warm, even when we were down to our last layer. One of the highlights was a crater lake called the frying pan lake. It’s certainly an apt name because steam and hot air vapour constantly rise from the lake. The magnificent part was the fact that it was evenly rising and every part of the lake had steam. Unfortunately, another lake, the inferno crater, which is THE highlight of the park, did not resemble how it was like in the brochures due to the huge amt of steam that day. While researching, I was drawn by the inferno crater because of it’s rich blue colour. Sobs…we didn’t get a chance to witness it at its best.

Frying Pan Lake

Surprisingly, the park was really quiet. At any one point, there were only ard 5 ppl in the huge park. We did an hour and a half of walking and reached Lake Rotoruahana where we were treated to a great view of Mt Tarawera. Yeefang and I sat there to admire the view while waiting for the shuttle bus to come.

Wai-o-tapu in contrast, was filled with ppl. First, we went to the biggest mud pool in the world? NZ? Rotorua? Can’t rem exactly. Haha.. The activity was astounding. At some points, the mud would spurt up to 70cm high. Then, we went to see the Lady Knox Geyser to see her explode. It wasn’t really that significant because it wasn’t a natural explosion. Park attendants would put soap to melt the wall between the cold and hot chamber in the geyser, causing it to explode daily and faithfully at 10.30am. At the Wai-o-tapu park itself, we were only given a short 1.5hrs to get thru the park. Yeefang and I were rushing thru it which was quite a pity cos we cldn’t admire the colours of the pools, not that they were that impressive actually. =p Once again, the pictures in the brochure deceived us. I think they must have had a fan blowing all the steam away before taking the pictures. W couldn’t see the true beauty of the pools due to the steam.