Rotoura – where earth shows her power.

Miffa and Miffo at Ohinemutu

This region is the home to the Arawa people, whose origin trace to the Arawa canoe in which the Polynesian warriors came here in the fourteenth century.

According to Maori oral tradition, the priest (Tohunga) Ngatoroirangi tried to climb the summit of Mount Tongariro but he feared dying from the extreme cold and so he prayed to the god of Hawaiki (Polynesian home land). The gods sent fire to the priest from inside the Earth that revealed as several volcanoes around the area.

Rotoura’s origin has firmly roots in tourism, in the last decades of the nineteenth century. One of the main attractions of that time it was the pink and the white terraces where people from all over the world travelled to take baths. After the destruction of the terraces by the eruption of Tarawera Volcano the government built the Government Sanatorium Complex to administer different spa treatments.

By far Rotoura has the bigger amount of tourist attraction per square meter of New Zealand. No matter what you like or dislike, surely you will find it here. Kiwi farms, sheep farms, 4wd driving, quads, the Zorb (you go downhill inside a big plastic ball), Maori experience, and of course spas.

Nothing to say except that prepare about 20 NZ$ average for every “attraction” whose quality range from fair to tourist trap rip off.

So if you are coming here, you have been warned.