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SHEEP BURPS AND OTHER ENVIRONMENTAL CRISES:MIDDLE EARTH, SOAP GEYSERS, AND A WHOLE LOT OF SHEEPRotorua is the Branson, Missouri of New Zealand. It is thetourist hub of New Zealand where you can find Maori culture,farming culture and the country’s new extreme culture all withina stone’s throw of each other. Not only is Rotorua a sort ofYellowstone meets Las Vegas, but it is also New Zealand’s oldesttourist attraction.Since 1901 Rotorua (pronounced Row-toe-roo-ah) has been thedestination in New Zealand. Originally tourists and locals wereattracted to the area for the presence of thermal wonderssimilar to Yellowstone. The thermal pools were partiallyconverted into mineral baths that became so popular in fact thatthe New Zealand government built three of them and created theposition of national “Government Balneologist”—one who studiestherapeutic bathing. Rotorua houses everything you’d ever needor want in geothermal activity, too: boiling mud vats, mineralbaths, sulfur lakes (they smell wonderful!), geysers, so on andso forth. But on top of this, Rotorua has somehow become a hubfor everything New Zealand: Zorbing, Maori Pas (fortresses),cultural exhibits, sheep exhibits at the Agrodome, AnimalReserves housing kiwis and other theme park events to boot.
This was a cultural powerhouse that an American couldappreciate. All the excitement without any of the fuss.It helps that things in Rotorua started off on a good foot.For one, the drive down was relaxing. The motorway south ofAuckland is a wide four lanes, relatively straight, and easy totravel—though you wouldn’t think so to look at the signs postedalongside the road: “tired drivers end up in nightmares”, and“drive to survive” signs peppered the three hour trip southward.(One favorite sign of mine put a nice little jingle to vehicularmanslaughter: “we like our children, we like our town, pleaseslow down.”) Even the weather was turning in our favor. Bynightfall, only an hour outside of the town the clouds had leftthe sky open and the stars of the Southern Hemisphere shown downand off, down in a valley not far away we could see the steamrising from the thermal reserves of New Zealand.When we turned in from the highway towards the city centersteam rose all around and the natural smell of sulfur lingeredin the air. Across a roundabout there were lights on at a moteland people were out on the balconies smoking and drinking,sometimes waving at a random car below. Shouts came from oneroom towards a person wrapped in a towel who was leaving one ofthe thermal pools across the way. We turned down another streetand saw the dark gloss of Lake Rotorua where explorers firsthappened upon Maori natives bathing in the steaming hot water.
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Only two blocks away we stepped out of the car to find arefreshing winter nip in the air that woke us up from the longdrive and invigorated us to explore. The real crème de la crèmeof the night occurred when we set our bags down in our hostelroom and noticed a sensation that I hadn’t felt in some time.Warmth. One advantage to living on an active fault line—coupled with kiwi ingenuity—is that much of the thermal steam isrouted from underground to homes and water tanks, making Rotoruaone of the only heated towns in New Zealand (from ourexperience, at least). An abundance of open bars helped warmme up to Rotorua, too, and as soon as we arrived we were at thePig & Whistle a police station turned bar (a sign of true socialprogress) where a lively crowd, guitarist and beer led ended awonderfully warm welcome into the city.At the top of our agenda was Rotorua’s geothermal activity.The most famous of all New Zealand’s geysers (more from goodadvertising than anything) is the Lady Knox Geyser housed behinda large fence in the Wai-o-Tapu Thermal Wonderland—a sort ofDisneyland version of geothermal dynamics. What’s interestingabout Wai-o-Tapu is that it charges admission to visit geysersand mud pools similar to—if not less spectacular than— the freegeysers and mud pools just down the road, yet people still comeand visit. However, due in part to a successful add campaign,Katie and I found ourselves at the parking lot of Wai-o-Tapu
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