I am skipping a few days and hoping to get back to them eventually…
We were late leaving our hotel in Rotorua, as the bed was soooo comfy we couldn't get out of it, and the weather was raining and sad.
 |
| View from our hotel window in Rotorua |
Most of the group are "get up and goers", but we have a difficult time getting up before 7 AM. Then it takes us near an hour to pack the car when the roof is up, because Philip has to remove it to load the special suitcases that fit behind the seats. So we get left behind the group and most likely miss out on many activities.
We chose not to stop at the thermal pools, nor the Lady Knox Geyser, as we have been to Yellowstone Park where we have seen very similar events, and the weather was drizzly and at times pouring rain. This is the strangest summer we Californians have seen, but we are told it is somewhat like an English summer.
 |
| Driving by the Thermal Pools |
We stop in the town of Taupo to have brunch, as we had slept so late we missed breakfast. While walking down one of the streets, we ran into much of the rest of the group who were either having lunch, shopping, or walking down the street. (don't have any photos). Having missed having sashimi, we managed to find a little hole in the wall restaurant where we had decent, not exceptional, sashimi for brunch.
Continuing down the road past Lake Taupo, we headed for the Tongariro National Park where we would spend two nights. The weather continued with intermittent showers.
 |
| Lake Taupo |
 |
| The Girls- Photo by Michael |
 |
| Philip and Elaine- Photo by Dave |
After checking into our hotel room, we managed to capture one good picture of one of the volcano mountains nearby from our window while we were sipping a cup of tea in our room.
 |
| Mt Tongariro (I believe) |
Cocktails were enjoyed in the lobby of the hotel,
 |
| Enjoying cocktails |
prior to a most wonderful dinner, where all the servers delivered each course to the entire table and placed the food simultaneously at your place setting. We had seen this at the Bracebridge Dinner at Yosemite, but never anywhere else.
 |
| Patsy and Michael at Dinner |
 |
| Tomato Basil Soup |
 |
| Duck Appetizer |
 |
| Fillet of Beef |
We headed to bed soon after dinner, as I am trying to fend off THE COLD that is going around the group.
I remember when we were kids and Susan went back to Illinois one summer and reported having rain. That was such a foreign concept to me I thought it portended some sudden and drastic climate change. Then I went to college in Ohio and found out that dry California weather is the exception.
ReplyDelete