The Adventure Continues...

We stopped the first night of vacation (we never made any reservations) at a little motel in Taupo called the Oasis.  It wasn't anything fancy but it had two bedrooms, a living area and a full kitchen, a steamy pool, sat right on the lake and it was immaculately clean (and really reasonably priced).  AJ1 fell asleep before we arrived so JJ and I donned swimsuits and took AJ2 for some rare two parents with the middle child bonding time.  It was fantastic to swim in the brisk night air and AJ2 was so, so happy!

Morning came early for mamma and the two big AJs (like 4:30 am early!) and I was that much more grateful for the living area of the hotel.  A bit later everyone else got up, JJ and I took the two bigs swimming and we were on the road again!  We headed out to Whakapapa and National Park.  What. A. Drive.

A Kiwi friend of mine talks about how she feels rather immune to the beautiful scenery here.  I cannot believe that these beautiful mountains volcanoes wouldn't affect anyone who sees them each and every time.

These photos may (or may not) look familiar, this was the set for Modor in the Lord of the Rings Trilogy and the area around it was used to film the Hobbit earlier this year.  It is also (and probably more importantly) a world heritage area.

I have not touched at all on the Maori (I apologize, I do not know how to place diacritics in blogger) people in New Zealand and I am not going to now except to say that there is a beautiful legend that I have read that is associated with the Maori and these mountains.  If you are interested, you can read it here.

Once we got up onto the mountains we had planned to go tramping but with the recent eruption, many of the  crossings were closed and we decided to move on.  Little did we know, our trip would reach the apex of excitement the next morning!

Family Firsts

We embarked on our first  vacation as a family of five.  In fact, we hadn't been on a family vacation since AJ1 had his first birthday (we spent that time at the Outer Banks in North Carolina).  AJ3 celebrated his first birthday at home and we headed out the next morning.  

We decided to do an old school driving vacation this time.  JJ and I both grew up with this kind of vacation with our families.  Junie and Mamaw would often load us all in the car (when I say all, I am serious, I can remember one trip to and from Florida, a twenty hour drive, with three teenagers, a pre-teen and Junie and Mamaw in a SEDAN!).  JJ's parents would often go on state and national park adventures.

Recently Mt. Tongariro spewed a good bit of ash and rock and we just had to see it ;)  We headed out for the central plains.  We spent most of our first day driving but made it to Rotorua in time to visit the Wai-O-Tapu Thermal Wonderland.  It was reaaally beautiful.  As usual, I was totally impressed by this little piece of the world but I was also totally impressed with Mamaw.  At 78 years old she pushed a pram through this park, up and down hills and then walked up and down hundreds of stairs.  I am so very grateful that God blessed me with such an amazing, amazing person who loves me.

I am a total nerd but I LOVED seeing this geothermal unit (and would have loved to investigate more).  I couldn't help but find myself wondering all about it's production, costs, efficiency, etc, etc, etc.  This is a no nuke country (I think of all the "No new nukes at North Anna" bumper stickers I read in Charlottesville).  You can take a girl out of the markets...