The intrepid travellers continue their journey around the North Island of New Zealand, heading wherever their noses and stomachs take them. For the past two days, they have been parked up in Rotorua, spending last night camped at the Rotorua Stockcar Club…

We’re members of the Motor Caravan Association, and proudly display a set of red ‘wings’ embellished with our membership number on the front of our motorhome. Apart from guaranteeing a friendly wave from every other wings-bearing motorhome that we pass, we also get this snazzy little book of places to hide overnight. The book lists everything from the free sites, to the cheap sites, to the campgrounds and waste dump sites. Very handy indeed.

Freedom camping at Hamurana

The other night was a free site at Hamurana. Unbeknownst to us, you can’t just rollup and park at any ol’ reserve or road siding in New Zealand (like we’d be doing for years). Each local council has it’s own rules around freedom camping. Luckily our new book tells us just where we are allowed to stop to freedom camp, and what the local council’s rules are. Gosh, the fines can be steep if you get it wrong, and we’re pleased we haven’t been caught in the past. Given that we’ve been stung for an expired WOF and registration ($400) and a towed for an expired pay-and-display parking ticket ($200) in the past fortnight, it’s best we try to play it safe now.

Last night we tried the next level up in accommodation and went to a ‘Park Over Place’ or ‘POP’. These are properties that are usually owned by other members and provide space for motorhomes to park at a very low cost. So for a grand total of $5, we parked up at the Rotorua Stockcar Club POP. Luckily we picked a night when the stockcars weren’t doing their thing, otherwise we wouldn’t have got much sleep. The Stockcar Club was great – just outside Rotorua and in the country, and we were the only people there (apart from the Caretakers up at their house). We refrained from taking the motorhome for a sprint around the track and instead chose to head into town to soak in the Polynesian Pools before returning back to the POP to sleep for the night.

Today we woke to a beautiful day, dawdled through breakfast, and then headed into Rotorua where Peter dragged us into the local VW centre in search of rare and exotic parts for his ever-rusting VW collection. Yes, just what we need – more VW bits! I sit here typing with two long Beetle running boards wrapped in brown paper jammed up against me. I’m beginning to think that we are travelling around in a car parts truck rather than a motorhome!

Then it was off to Pizza Hut for a $10.95 all-you-can-eat lunch (quantity minus the quality – won’t be repeating in a hurry), followed amazingly by a long cycle around Rotorua’s thermal waterfront. I guess we had to work lunch off somehow…

Thermal walkway (well, we cycled)

The Waterfront Thermal Walkway is great – I never knew it existed. It travels right behind the Government Gardens and out past the Polynesian Pools.

Rotorua Museum (Government Gardens)

After our cycle, we thought we might head off to Taupo. So we packed up the motorhome and headed down SH5. Just before Wai-o-tapu, we spied a sign pointing towards the Waikite Valley thermal pools. Well, it had been nearly 24 hours since we had taken the waters, so we turned off to continue our adventure in previously unnavigated territory.

A short 6km trip bought us to the Waikite Thermal Pools and Campground. Here we quickly worked out that if we stayed the night, we got free entry to the pools. This effectively meant that we were paying only $12 to stay the night in the campground. This would be our most expensive camping site yet!

Much to my delight, I found the campsite had a power connection. Now, we have never connected our motorhome to power before – even at Waiwera. Amazing things happened when I connected the power lead up to the supply box. No, nothing exploded or caught fire. Just new lights inside the motorhome started working (the 240v ones), and the microwave oven and fridge burst into life (we’d just been using the fridge in gas mode until now). Gosh this was civilised. And there was even a washing machine at the camp so that we could put Peter’s socks through a few cycles.

The thermal pools here at Waikite Valley are great. Boiling water gushes out of the ground and along a surging stream, and the pool people draw water from the stream and spray it into the air to cool it before it runs down a channel and into the pools. Each night they empty the pools completely, then refill them again each morning. The joy of camping here means that we can have another soak tomorrow before we leave. These value-seeking Kiwis must get their money’s worth!

More photos to follow soon. Our loose plan is to head to Taupo, and then Ruapehu. But the plan changes daily, which is just how things should be really.

Peter bothering the swans on Lake Rotorua