Written by Abby Hall and Joanne Huang

After a good night rest we all packed into the vans Easter morning and drove twenty minutes out of Rotorua to the Waimangu Volcanic Valley Park which boasts the youngest geothermal site in the world. The site was created by an eruption of Mt Tarawera over Lake Rotomahana in 1886. We took a walk through the park, earning strange looks from passers-by because of the stick on mustaches (given to us by Ikumi with Easter candy) some of us elected to wear.

At the end of all the steaming rivers and craters was Lake Rotomahana where we took a boat ride to see some of the sights including the area where the Pink Terraces, which where destroyed by the eruption of Mt. Tarawera. That afternoon was spent exploring the city of Rotorua some more, watching movies, and chatting to our fellow travellers at the hostel. The next day we said goodbye to the Crash Palace drove off to visit the Wai-O-Tapu Thermal Park, where the Lady Knox geyser is set off every morning at 10:30 using a bit of detergent to get it going.  The park was very popular and the morning we went it was packed to the gills with other tourist taking advantage of the Easter break to take in the sites. After the geyser we all split into groups to take advantage of the various walks available at our own paces and met back up at lunch time to leave the park. After exploring the parks strange colored pools and craters we packed up and headed off to our campsite at Waikite Valley Thermal Pools. The campsite boasts several large pools that are filled with water from the Te Manaroa spring which boils up out of the ground. We all spent the evening talking, playing cards, and soaking in the pools before going to bed. In the morning the kids and a few brave students got into cold swimsuits for one last swim before we packed up and headed back down to Wanganui to gear up for the last trip of the semester and our impending departure from New Zealand. 

When we arrived back to the Quaker Settlement, and many of us were forced to remember that our final paper for our Environmental Issues course was due. Working on the paper and prepping ourselves for the impending Marlborough Sounds trip was how we spent the next two days and on the 25th we met with Kerry and  Anthony, who we met on our Kapiti area hike, and hopped on the ferry to Picton. In Picton, we met up with Tim, who was one of the three guides who would be with us on our journey through the sounds and enjoyed a delicious dinner of pork soup (or white bean soup for our meatless friends).  By universal agreement everyone went to bed (very) early to get ready for the next day where we would begin our trip with a 56 km bike ride through the inner sounds to Mistletoe Bay. On the 26th we woke up in various states of excitement or nerves, packed our lunches and walked down to the Picton harbor to pick up our bikes and begin our final trip of the semester.