Grandad's photos

Waiotapu was the first stop today and a walk for 1.5 hours through the thermal valley. A lot of mudpools, silica formations and different coloured pools.



At 10:15 it was time to visit the Lady Knox Geyser. It was originally discovered by prisoners about 1900 who did some washing in the warm pool and set it off by letting soap go down the vent. They put a cairn of stones around it which have since been covered by silica. Every day at 10:15 a man gives a talk and drops in some soap!



Then through to Taupo via Huka Falls and on to Whakapapa where the weather was low clouds and rain. Tomorrow 6am departure for Hamilton Airport and the end of the tour.

We visited the Agrodome for their morning show, this was good entertainment! They had about 15 different breeds of sheep that were very tame, and didn't even mind a dog on their back! Several from the audience hand milked a cow, and hand fed some lambs. We watched a sheep sheared and an eye-dog rounding up some geese on the stage without barking.



After that a visit to Rainbow Springs to see big trout and a lot of native birds, then to Te Puia for geysers and the Maori village.

I took the two customers to Rotorua, via Whangamata, Waihi and Mt Maunganui. Weather was close to rain but not too bad.



They had the beach to themselves at Whangamata.



At Waihi we had a look at the big hole that is Martha Mine, a local told us they were about to set off explosives. The local school came up to watch, but it wasn't that amazing and the wind was so strong we couldn't hear any bangs.

Here's a couple of phone camera snaps of day 1 from my trip away this week with 2 people from UK in a rental car.



Cathedral Cove, near Hahei.



Pauanui, from Motu peak.

Although my Nokia 6230 is working fine, it only cost $40 and being essential for my job, I thought a spare would be a good idea. Nokia improved some aspects of the 6230 in the 6230i model. They put a centre button in the navigation key, which more often than not selected something you didn't want. And they improved the old 0.3 Megapixel camera to a 1.3 Megapixel. And the screen is a nice and sharp 204 x 204 compared to 128 x 128. It's very nice to use, bought on eBay from UK. Being a similar model it fits the 6230 batteries & chargers and runs Bluetooth for the handsfree earpiece.



Here are three shots from the camera.