Hi there
Summer is all but here. It's still officially Spring but I've just returned from a week's holiday (yes, yes, another one, but you know me, you won't see me for dust once I hit the good weather).
I went to Mount Maunganui, and Lake Taupo. I walked a lot. Along beaches. On the track round the base of The Mount. In Taupo, I hiked the track from Spa Park to Huka Falls - scenery great, but, oh, those hills!
I was stunned how civilised the hot water spring in Spa Park, at the beginning of the Huka Falls track, had become since I was there, just a few years ago. It all used to be pure nature. It was slippy-slidey over the rocks to get down the riverbank and into the water. The scenery all around was bushland and there was a little old bridge over which people could peer down at those sitting in the warm water as it spurted out around the bathers from the natural rock formation. The warm water flowed out to the cold river with its dangerous currents (don't swim out from spa cove, it's dangerous).
Nowadays, at the hot water spring, there are steps into the water, landscaped picnic areas, a viewing platform, toilets, and -what?! - a cafe!??! The area is one hundred percent gentrified.
I was so stunned at the area's transformation that I forgot to take photos. And you can tell I'm not an influencer...
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Yesterday morning, as I was leaving Taupo, aiming for Turangi, I got turned back from Highway No 1, and told to drive right around the lake instead. I was so upset because I'm one of those people who always gets lost when travelling somewhere new. Instead of my journey home taking five hours, it took seven, and I also got lost around the Transmission Gully area, trying to not end up driving the Gully but ended up driving it anyway.
And it turned out that a long distance lorry had fallen into Lake Taupo, from one of the sharp corners of Highway No 1.
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