World Tour Stop 5- Rotorua, NZ

From Auckland we drove south towards Rotorua (geothermal wonderland). On the route down we stopped at the Waitomo Glow Worm Caves which were a popular attraction and very crowded. This was a reasonable price ($30/person) and took you through caves that had formed for thousands of years. The glow worms are only visible when it is pitch dark so no pictures are allowed. I think this was cool but a skippable event if you want to save a little.

From here we drove to Hobbiton which honestly, was something I've wanted to do for YEARS. It was so cool and I loved every minute. Our guide, Matt, was hilarious and quizzed us on all kinds of minute details from the LOR and Hobbit movies that I doubt anyone actually remembers (a scene that was shown for 5 seconds of film for example).

The tour is about two and half hours and you get to walk through the entire Shire, visiting individual homes and most importantly, Bag End where Bilbo and Frodo lived.

The party tree and then Sam Gangee's house are also highlighted and you get to see where the first film started with Frodo running up and greeting Gandolf as he rides into Hobbiton on his wagon with a massive keg of ale. The tour ends with a hobbit ale at the Green Dragon where you can try on hobbit clothes and sit and enjoy the fishing pond. I was a giddy child for the entirety of this tour and I think Bri just humored me.

This was a great day and we ended by getting to our AirBnB in Rotoura. We headed to Terrace Kitchen for dinner as that had been recommended to us, but honestly we did not have a great experience. The food was pretty expensive and the beer that I was served was given to me in a glass that still had remnants of a smoothie in it (which I sadly didn't notice until I'd had half the beer). Anyways, the service was also not great, so while this is probably the nicest restaurant in town I would say give it a pass.

On the next day, we had a pretty chill day and decided to spend most of the day relaxing in the Kerosene Creek hot springs. The springs are located about 20KM south of Rotorua and the walking track is only about 200m from the car park. Super easy to get to and not crowded like the more well known geothermals in the area.

The other thing that was suggest that we do is a Maori traditional ceremony and dinner but this was a bit out of our price range for $130. I would say if you have a little more funds that it seemed like a really cool thing to attend to learn more about the original inhabitants of New Zealand.

We did do the Redwoods Treewalk that evening and it was really cool. I think if we had it to redo that I would buy the day/night pass to be able to experience both the lit up trees and suspension bridges as well as the daytime views. This was $29 NZD for the night pass and another $10NZD to do the dual pass.

That's it for Rotoura, on to Taupo!