A busy day today as we visited three of the North Island’s most popular natural attractions.

The Huka Falls are said to be the most visited attraction in New Zealand. There’s no admission charge and the car park is free. Once there, there are several paths you can take along the Waikato River. We wandered up stream for about 40 minutes, leaving the crowds behind. We would have gone further only we’d forgotten to bring water – and of course, our legs were killing us from the Tongariro Crossing. The river was crystal clear, and the water a stunning bright blue. This is the river which feeds Lake Taupo. There were no boats on the river, perhaps because of the Falls.

 

Just before the falls, the river enters a 20 metre wide gorge and then abruptly narrows to 15 metres as it crosses a hard, volcanic ledge. It then cascades in a dynamic and powerful waterfall. The water turns white and foamy as it crashes down – apparently the name ‘Huka’ means foam in Maori. We sat by the falls and had a picnic. Then it was back in the car for the next item on today’s super touristy itinary – Craters of the Moon.

Craters of the Moon is a geothermal site which is part of Wairakei, the largest geothermal field in New Zealand. Apparently, the site is not that old – it sprang up in the 1950’s when a nearby thermal power station lowered underground water levels. Your admission price buys you a 45 minute walk around the field, which is reminiscent of a lunar landscape – hence the name! Not much grows here, but the volcanic soils are colourful and there are craters, blowholes and a mudpool to view.

The entire field is emitting steam from fumaroles (openings where steam and gases are emitted).  There’s a smell of rotten eggs in the air – it’s the sulphur. I had the slightly thrilling/alarming sense that at any time, some of this bubbling, steaming heat might turn into a full blown eruption.

 

Item 3 on our itinary was the Wai-O-Tapu Thermal Wonderland. This is a scaled up version of Craters of the Moon. There are several walks of varying lengths. You could spend the whole day walking round here. One big attraction is the Lady Knox Geyser which goes off every morning at exactly 10.15 a.m. Sadly, we didn’t get here until after lunch, so we missed the Geyser, but there were plenty of other amazing things to see.

 

The craters were bigger than at Craters of the Moon, the colours even more striking. The black, bubbling craters have slightly old-fashioned names like Devil’s Home and Devil’s Inkpots which made me giggle.

The champagne Pool is a massive lake at the heart of the ‘Wonderland’ with garish shades of yellow, red and blue. Other pools are smaller but equally weird and wonderful in shades of red, blue and fluorescent yellow.

I’m sure New Zealanders take this kind of thing in their stride, but for a Pom like me, it was totally surreal.