Taupo

From Napier it was inland to Taupo on a beautiful sunny day, seeing the Mohaka waterfalls by the roadside, and long views across the plains to the three main peaks, Ruapehu, Ngauranuhe and a third whose name I didn't record, now seeming to have ceased their activity. There are more falls - more rapids - just outside Taupo, at the Haka falls at the bottom of a gorge where hardier souls than we were bungee jumping.

Taupo is built beside an enormous caldera lake, (the Haka falls being its outflow) and we took a cruise on it, seeing the famous modern Maori carvings on a cliff on the lakeside, and Errol Flynn's yacht being sailed on the open water.

Looking north from the lake, the hills behind Taupo can be seen as a female form, the sleeping princess.