The weather was good for the majority of the trip, so we couldn’t really complain on day 13 when it rained and rained and paused and rained some more. After talking about some alternatives over another breakfast at McDonald’s in Roturoa, everyone finally settled on white water rafting since they would get wet during that activity anyway. We hopped in the cars and drove from Rotorua to Taupo, where everyone checked into their next motel, but there was a mix up on our sub-groups departure date and no room reserved (or available) for us. We decided to return to Auckland a day earlier than we needed to and plan some fun things to do there on our last full day in the country.
Back to rafting: Melanie, Gloria, Elizabeth, Ky, and I all passed on it. Everyone had their reasons; I’ve been white water rafting outside Jackson Hole, WY and while it was fun, it wasn’t something that I was eager to do again when faced with the choice of going to a coffee shop. Yes, I feel old saying that; get off my lawn.
So, we went to The Coffee Club, which is a chain and a good one (I always feel like I should seek out locally owned coffee places). The one in Taupo has a great view of Lake Taupo and Flip, a kinetic sculpture by Phil Price, which was really interesting to watch in the wind & rain. I think we intended to just get a quick bite and then walk around Taupo and the lake, but we ended up lounging for (probably) 2 or more hours. By the time we emerged, there was only enough time for a short walk along the lakefront before hopping back in the car to (I think) Turangi, where we had dropped everyone else off at the rafting place. (And then we headed back to Aukland with Gloria and Elizabeth while everyone else went to dinner and their motel.)
The full flickr album is here.
Little Golden Notebook 