3- Rotorua

My 65th birthday...so thankful to be healthy and able to be traveling with Rog in the gorgeous and warm country!  After a lovely breakfast, a quick bike ride and a warm hug from Frances's, we were back on a bus headed to Rotorua.  Again we passed hundreds of grazing dairy cows but also lots of sheep, a few llamas, horses & goats and even two herds of deer...not sure if they were wild or being pastured.  Our Air B & B hostess here is Beryl.  What a hoot!  She is 84 yrs old and started hosting last year cause she "just didn't just want to sit around for the next 16 years"...figures she'll live as long as her mum did.  Her home is very Victorian, full of antiques all covered with lacy doilies.  Gorgeous flowers are blooming everywhere.  She says she needs to feel grass under her feet to live.  She races up and down her stairs...as she says "like a scorched rabbit"...to check her Air B & B site.  She chucked that just last year she'd been in a restaurant with her granddaughter and when they left she'd said, "Wonder why we did't get our cookies?"  "Cookies?" Asked your granddaughter. "Yes, the sign said free wifi!"  She's learned lots since then!  After our nice visit wit Beryl, we went into town for a delicious dinner.  Then we went to Rainbow springs just at dusk and strolled through the paths of identified fauna...many ancient species and only found in NZ.  Dimly lit were glass aquariums filled with geckos, salamanders and the ancient tuatara...a species over 200 million years old.  No wonder they filmed Jurrastic Park here!  After it got dark, we crept into the kiwi area and listened for the rustle of leaves.  And sure enough, out from under the bush raced a kiwi...stuck his long thin beak up and then hustled back.  We were treated to 4 more sightings of this nocturnal, ever so shy, but famous bird that NZers use as their nickname. 

    Next morning...my birthday in USA...I was flooded with birthday wishes via email and Facebook.  What a blessing to have such a loving family and many friends!  I so appreciated all the wishes!!  We'd slept in til 8:30.  Beryl had a proper breakfast waiting for us and she was off to pick blueberries.  We'd lined up a trip to TePuia...a former Maori village gushing with geysers, mud pools and thermal pools...in other words, smelly and hot but fascinating.  We spent a couple hours hiking around and searching for shady spots with views.  Then we went to a Maori cultural show and learned more are out the past.  Our guide told us the Maori traditionally slept standing up and even today, their elders sleep better sitting up--maybe Joyce (Rog's mom) is part Maori since she has been sleeping sitting up in her chair for 40 yrs!  Their language was only oral until the Europeans came and using just 9 consonants and 5 vowels made it a written language.  Before they arrived, the Maori family tribes often fought amongst themselves but now they are united in their demands for rights and gov't compensation.  One Maori said one of the biggest problems the Europeans brought was a disease called obesity & diabetes...their diet!  Then she broke out in a laugh and her large belly jiggled!!  Time to end this post.... KIA ORA. (Maori for Live Long)