Geothermal Wonderland

New Zealanders all know Rotorua as a fabulous geothermal wonderland but many may never have taken advantage of the beautiful and serene boutique lodges and estates that the area is known for internationally. The Geothermal areas of Rotorua are the most popular tourist attraction in this area and hence, Whakarewarewa is the place you must not miss!

Soaking yourself into hot pool...shiok!


After departing from Agrodome, we finally arrived at Te Puia, New Zealand's Maori Arts and Crafts Institute in which we experienced the rhythms of the Poi dance, the ferocity of the haka and the complexity of the Tititorea (playing stick games when they are bored since no facebook back then)


I still can't pronounce it even though our tour guide said that many many times. Te whakarewarewa....


The sacred meeting house of Māori


We were greeted by Maori and told on the welcome ceremony before entering the meeting house.It begins with a pōwhiri or welcome. If a visitor is noteworthy, he or she may be welcomed with an aggressive challenge by a warrior armed with a taiaha (traditional fighting staff), who then offers a token of peace, such as a fern frond, to the visitor. Acceptance of the token in the face of such aggression is a demonstration of the courage and mana (charisma) of the visitor.





The haka - an action chant, often described as a "war dance" with loud fierce shouts, but more a chant with hand gestures and foot stamping, originally performed by warriors before a battle, proclaiming their strength and prowess and abusing the opposition. Now it is regularly performed by the All Blacks, the New Zealand national rugby union team before a game begins.




The different face expression is to scare their enemies.




Have you seen this somewhere?


The boiling mud pools




The famous Pohutu Geyser, which spurts boiling water and steam high into the air on a regular basis.




You can smell Rotorua before you even arrive – that awful rotten egg smell coming from the sulphurous pools of bubbling, boiling mud. All over town, even in backyards, there are pools of boiling water and mud.




Maori used to cook here and they were free from any diseases because of the food they took not until Europeans came to New Zealand in increasing numbers from the late 18th century and the weapon technologies and diseases they brought with them.




Get what I mean? Geothermal is everywhere!

Journey to Agrodome

Here comes the New Zealand's visitor attraction that you must not miss! Speaking of New Zealand, what comes through your mind? Like duh, sheep lah! So when you come to Rotorua, it's a must to visit Agrodome.

The journey to Agrodome, Rotorua was indeed long and bored cause all you can see are farms, cows and farms...and cows...and farms..*yawnnn*




Kiwi Bird isn't this big actually, it somehow looks like a weird creature to me. No idea why is it called Kiwi Bird. Does it look like a bird?

After an introduction to New Zealand farming, we then joined an hour tour around the farm with informative commentary on the many aspects of agriculture featured on the Agrodome farm.

We were given opportunity to walk around amongst the animals and feed sheep and emus by hand.










Yummy yummy meat :)




Sheep dog is trained to herd or guard sheep.


Nice booootay :)




A 5 years experienced shearer explained how to use the blade shears.


Big fat sheep.










Initially, I was excited to get inside to grab knitted wear as I thought it'd be cheaper than city. However, those are hand knitted made so I can't expect it to be fairly cheap.


Get the wool wash first and let it dry before proceed to next step.


Carding is the processing of brushing raw or washed fibers to prepare them as textiles. A large variety of fibers can be carded, anything from dog hair, to llama, to soy fiber, to polyester. Cotton and wool are probably the most common fibers to be carded. Carding fibers was used to be by hand in which hand carders that looks similar like dog brushes were used to brush the wool. Obviously, it would probably take years and hence technology had solved the trouble. Although Platt wool carding machine (the picture above) was made in UK in 1906, it is still working as well as it did the day it started.Much stronger than your grandfather.


The last process, spinning wheel. Spinning is an ancient textile art in which synthetic fibers are twisted together to form yarn.

A short clip of shearing sheep. Enjoy :)