Rotorua Maori Cultural Village

So we arrived at the Maori Culture capital of New Zealand, we booked into our hostel which was right in the heart of the action, great news for us no walking miles with backpacks lol! We set off out n took a walk down to the local Maori village. We gatecrashed someone else guided tour and learnt all about the village it was discovered in the late 1800's. We wandered around and got talking to a few of the locals who were more than happy to discuss Maori culture and heritage it turned out to be a really interesting afternoon. Afterwards the sun was shining so we decided to take a walk along the lake it was a lovely walk where we saw black swans and beautiful fish we kept on walking until we came to a secluded little beach that no one seemed to know about! it was beautiful just a small beach but it was soo quiet and beautiful and we were the only ones there...Amazing! We decided we had a hard day adn took a walk back to our hostel where it was free pizza night woohoo!! We kept quiet that we had al;ready been to the Dominoes next door n had a pizza already hehe and stuffed ourselves with as much free pizza as possible haha! Then we chilled out watching movies, eating pizza and drinking beer with a Dutch guy and a guy from Columbia all swapping traveling stories and having a laugh! Then it was bedtime Goodnight :D xxxxxx

Next day we went to the Maori cultural centre called Te Pui. We had a tour around the place it was really cool the first thing our guide taught us was how to say his home towns tribal name .......Taumata­whakatangihanga­koauau­o­tamatea­turi­pukakapiki­maunga­horo­nuku­pokai­whenua­kitanatahu!! Yes it was hard to say and no we cant remember how to say it now haha!! We saw Kiwi birds which were really cute and we went to see the geysers which were amazing! Geysers are due to volcanic eruptions underground and make huge jets of steam and water burst out of the ground! It was amazing!! It was hard to believe it was natural and not man made but the guide explained how it all worked to us and we were impressed! After me asking the guide a million and one questions our tour ended! he was really cool and explained to us all about his tribe took us into their village hall and explained their way of life..he also told us that he was going out hunting tonight wow! After trying to hitchhike home (but no one would pick us up...we must have loked bad haha) We got the local bus back. That night we went out to a local farmers market in the middle of the village, it was great with lots of yummy food n arts and crafts made tbe the locals! we got talking to a lady who sold homemade garlic sauce and houmus and fresh pitta bread she was asking us all about our travels ect and liked us so much she said we could have as much of her tasters as we wanted for free and then gave us to cups of homemade lentil soup which was delicious, and told us we could take home a pot of garlic cream and bread for free wow!! We were made up because it was so delicious :D after trying some more samples of bread cheese ect hehe, we went to the local pub where we made friends with the barmaid she was from Wales and she gave us free drinks all night haha! We couldn't believe our luck! after our drinks and watching the rugby we went home happy full and tired and went to bed!