{"id":14397,"date":"2018-10-24T00:08:35","date_gmt":"2018-10-24T04:08:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/?p=14397"},"modified":"2018-11-07T16:56:52","modified_gmt":"2018-11-07T21:56:52","slug":"tauranga-new-zealand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/?p=14397","title":{"rendered":"Tauranga, New Zealand"},"content":{"rendered":"

Wednesday – \u00a0October 24, 2018<\/p>\n

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The Majestic Princess didn\u2019t have far to travel last night from Auckland to Tauranga. \u00a0\u201cKia Ora\u201d is the Maori greeting which means Welcome or Hello or Good Luck, depending on its use. \u00a0Mount Manganui (man-yuh-new-ee) at the entrance to the harbor and the end of the peninsula is the most dominant feature of the tiny town.<\/p>\n

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There was a realistic looking statue of a Maori fisherman out in the harbor next to the last red buoy.<\/p>\n

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We had signed up for an excursion to see the countryside, so we boarded a tour bus. \u00a0However, I was a little sad to leave Tauranga because it looked like an ideal peaceful little town to explore. \u00a0As a matter of fact, the bus driver\/guide mentioned that there were many retirees in Tauranga because it was such a lovely place to live.<\/p>\n

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It was a beautiful spring day and we wanted to see more of New Zealand. \u00a0There are many peaceful lakes near Tauranga. \u00a0Further away there were many steep rolling hills covered with Monterey pine trees which is one of New Zealand\u2019s major export. \u00a0The North American trees are cut, replanted, grow and mature in twenty-five years, and are re-harvested for trade with China.<\/p>\n

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After driving for an hour and a half, we reached our first destination was Rainbow Springs, a conservation and nature preserve. \u00a0Besides the silver fern tree, New Zealand\u2019s official tree, we also saw mature North American giant Redwoods.<\/p>\n

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We also saw several native New Zealand birds which included a couple of brown kiwi birds. \u00a0They\u2019re nocturnal and are kept in a special building where their day and night cycles were \u00a0reversed so people could see them in action. The kiwi birds\u2019 quarters were dark and it was challenging to find the small brown birds as they moved around their pens.<\/p>\n

Later we were driven to the geothermal region near the city of Rotorua. \u00a0We went to the Waimangu Volcanic Valley which is a regional park where visitors are escorted along the geothermal pools. \u00a0We were first greeted by four members of the local Maori tribe who sang and danced a welcome greeting for us.<\/p>\n

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Later, we rode a bus to one of the bubbling lakes nearby. It was amazing to see the steam rising from the blue water. \u00a0Steam could also be seen coming out the rocks.<\/p>\n

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At the end of lake where the water was more shallow, there were small geysers and bubbling pools of sulfur.<\/p>\n

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Then we went to a site which had been a small volcano. \u00a0The guide explained that the hot water boils up and spills over the banks every few weeks.<\/p>\n

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We also had a boat ride on a lovely lake which was an extinct volcano and had bubbling geysers along one side. \u00a0On the far side of the lake there was a tall mountain with a volcanic hole in one side. \u00a0This volcanic area reminded us of Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming.<\/p>\n

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We made it back to the ship just in time for the \u201cSail Away\u201d from Tauranga. \u00a0Time flew by quickly today and we learned much about the culture and natural resources of New Zealand.<\/p>\n

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Wednesday – \u00a0October 24, 2018 The Majestic Princess didn\u2019t have far to travel last night from Auckland to Tauranga. \u00a0\u201cKia Ora\u201d is the Maori greeting which means Welcome or Hello or Good Luck, depending on its use. \u00a0Mount Manganui (man-yuh-new-ee) at the entrance to the harbor and the end of the peninsula is the most […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31,62],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14397","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cruising","category-new-zealand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14397","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14397"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14397\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14460,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14397\/revisions\/14460"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14397"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14397"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14397"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}