Leaving Taupo, I was able to stash my bag at the motel, so I wandered around the town for a while before taking the bus to Rotorua.

Ended up capturing this picture, which I’m pretty happy with;

… And this one, which just looks nice.

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Then, on to Rotorua.

To be honest, I didn’t much see the point of photographing a lot of the scenic stuff in Rotorua. I’m using a cellphone camera, and it can’t capture as much as my eyes can, so the photos end up looking a bit crap.

My hostel was the Funky Green Voyager, which was a fantastic first hostel for the trip.
It’s set a very high bar, not in the least because of the profusion of comfy spaces to sprawl in while reading a book, or doing computer things. Using the kitchen was exactly as chaotic as I’d assumed it was going to be; Just making a cup of coffee required tricky timing to get through the crowd to the jug, then out again while it boiled, then back in.

Did some Big Red Couch stuff, had actual conversations with five different people, looked at the scenic wonders of Rotorua without actually spending any money on them, …, nothing spectacular, but it was kind of relaxing.
I did wander around the shoreline of the lake, where many thousands of midges wanted to be friends with my nostrils.
I also went to the Night Market, which was pretty fun; They’d closed off a couple of streets, put up those expanding stall things, had some live music. (One of whom was pretty good when he did his own stuff, but then he switched to acoustic covers of Creed songs, which … were not as good)

My one obnoxiously tourist thing was to go and ride the luge; Did this on my last day in town, between check out (where they gave me a guide to BBH Hostels & told me what percentage rating to try to stay above) and taking the bus to Tauranga.
I was able to stash my pack at the i-Site/Bus Terminal, and my backpack in a locker at the top of the luge, so there was no risk of loss or damage.

I’d forgotten how nice the view is from up a mountain – My attention was more focused on riding the little carts down said mountain.
That said; Look how pretty it is!

So I spent some time riding little gravity carts down a hill, on a variety of tracks which wind through forest, then riding a chairlift back up. Didn’t crash into anyone or injure myself, which is an improvement on last time, when I hit the side of the track hard enough to come out of the cart and slide to a stop on the dirt.
Best Day Ever!

And there’s the view.

They’ve got a lot of mountain bike … paraphenalia? … there too. Tracks I’d be hesitant about doing on foot were visible from the gondola which takes you up the mountain, and from the chairlifts which take you back to the top of the luge runs.
Saw the occasional mountain biker on the trails, and many more riding the gondola back up, so I’m not sure where they all went. According to a couple of staff members I talked to on the ride down, there aren’t as many stretcher/airlift rescues as you’d expect.

The staff members also mentioned a very professional luge-cart rustling operation which had been going on, now broken up by Police. None of us could work out why anyone would steal the things; The only work on very smooth concrete and significant slopes, so they’d be bugger-all use to anyone other than a luge operation.

I’d taken a municipal bus out there, but walked back, pausing to take a picture of course;

Quite by accident, I found the end of the line in Rotorua.

There is an operation running little two-person railcars on what used to be the rail line into Rotorua.
Not sure why there’s no train running to a major tourist centre, but there isn’t.

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And that was Rotorua.

The bus arrived late, which wouldn’t have been an issue if there hadn’t been a plan for folks to come & pick me up from the drop-off in Tauranga. It all worked out OK, thanks to the wonder of cellphones, a Dutch chap whose daughter was on the bus & giving estimates of lateness, and some guesswork on my part as to when “about fifteen minutes out” was in a town I’d not been to in decades.