Whangarei & Northland then further South

Time for the second update from New Zealand - this time coming to you from the smelly volcanic town of Rotorua, famous for its hot springs, healing waters and adventure sports.
Earlier this week we were in Whangarei, staying at the Piano Hill farmstay run by a great English chappie called Stu. Location was great, a 30 acre farm with plenty of horses and a friendly dog called Snoop, but impossible to get out of with public transport. We had no option but to rent a car, and for $45 a day we got an automatic Toyota Platz. With our brand new set of wheels we set of north towards Waipoua Kauri Forest where there are some of the oldest (and largest) trees in New Zealand - its difficult to date them, but Tane Mahuta, the oldest, is said to be at least 2,000 years old.
On our second day with wheels we visited Whangarei Falls, the Abbey Caves and the Whangarei Heads. All free activities, and all nice to boot. At Abbey Caves we even had our first encounter with glow worms. These caves are a nice, unexploited piece of nature - therefore the going is a bit tough (and wet) but there were hardly any people in the area when we got there, and no one was in the cave we decided to explore.
We got to Rotorua yesterday (21st January) and had a rest after a whole day on the bus. Today it was pouring down again, so we didn't quite make it to anything in the early morning but when the rains let off we went for a walk around the town's hot springs and mud pools, then in the afternoon we went White Water Rafting with Kaituna Cascades - the guides were great, we were the only people on the boat besides the Japanese kayakers who seemed to work at the place. The guys at the place were even nice enough to let us have a second go at no extra cost! If you're ever passing through Rotorua you should really give the sport a go - I even got out of the boat and floated down some of the tamer rapids... a great experience and I certainly would do it again if the opportunity arose!

No photo updates today sadly, I'm on a public computer and I don't want to load all of my photos into picasa, but I did manage to put some shots up on Facebook.

Till next time, take it easy!
Stevo