Volcanic Activities!

Colleen and I's final stop on our last shebang was to Wai o Tapu Geothermal Wonderland.  This was one of my absolute favorite places in New Zealand.  Rotorua sees a lot of volcanic activity so just driving down the road you can see bubbling water or random steam rising from the ground.  And it's rather smelly because of all the sulphur...

Smells aside the geothermal activity was incredible.  It was like nothing I've ever seen, and the uniqueness of it almost made it look fake! 

 ^ The above picture is called the "Artist's Pallet".  Earthquakes tilted the spring, causing mineral water to flow over the sinter encrusted flat.  It's called the Artist's Pallet because mineral deposits streak the surface and are distributed by the direction of the wind.  The cloudy yellow/green water is acid-sulphate.  The orange is Antimony/Arsenic.  Green/Yellow is sulphur/Arsenic.

Yay steam! (It was actually really smelly steam). 

 ^ The above pictures is of the "Champagne Pool".  This came about from a 700 year old explosion crater formed by a hydro-thermal eruption.  

This was one of the coolest lakes.  It looks fake! (I swear it's not).

And because Colleen and I cannot take any trips without some quirk, this entire Shire and Geothermal day was done with 0 hours and 0 minutes of sleep.  We stay in hostels, and while you do get to meet awesome people, there are some of those special people who you just will never forget because they snore so loud you feel your eardrums will burst and the whole room smells like gross breath.  I decided to try and sleep in the car, but for some reason someone from inside the hostel from inside a room kept shining a flashlight at me in the car.  It was very strange and scary so i ended up leaving the car in a hurry and at 2am officially locked the keys in the car.  I decided I'd deal with it in the morning and try and sleep in a chair in the hostel.  Unfortunately, I did not even sleep for a minute.  Needless to say, the next night I decided to pay extra to stay in a single room.  Totally worth it.  And the locked keys in the car only threw us 3 hours and $65 off (that is cheap for NZ).  

Although unfortunately this was the last trip for Colleen and I, in almost exactly a week Mom will be here and our adventure will begin!