Success is getting what you want; happiness is liking what you get

Friday 4 November 2016

A slow day’s travelling - Taupo to Rotorua

We should be thankful – the gas bottle ran out and needed changing, but not in the middle of the night, with a storm raging outside, as usually happens.  It didn’t happen till 7.00am, when Robin decided to make an early morning cuppa.  The gas flame flickered, and went out, so it was time to change the bottle, and take a trip up town a little later in the morning  to refill the empty one, of course. 

Watching the tandem sky-divers jumping out of small planes kept us entertained while we were staying at Taupo Airport.  Are they brave or crazy, we wondered?  This is not something that we would ever do!

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Tandem sky-divers

The small airport had plenty happening too.  Planes arrived and departed during the day.  And the helicopters just across the road from the camp noisily started up their motors, whup, whup, whup, before finally lifting off and going about their business. 

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Planes at Taupo airport

We slowly packed up, topped up the water and left the Taupo Airport NZMCA site.  It had been a good couple of days, just a little chilly overnight.  Through the new gate we went, on to do the necessary business at the dump station.

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Time to leave Taupo Airport NZMCA site

We had been invited to lunch and talk quilts with a couple of Jenny’s quilting friends.  They live just a little way out of town, past the lookout at the top of the hill.  It was a lovely lunch indeed, thanks Linda and Peggy, and then they sent us on our way with a little home baking.

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Overlooking Lake Taupo

Leaving Taupo after lunch we started our drive to Rotorua, arranging to meet up with caravan friends Bill and Val for afternoon tea.  But we overshot the rest area (how embarrassing is that) and had to turn around and back track a little way.  In our defense we had to say that we didn’t really know about this particular rest area.  But a nice hot cuppa was made on our arrival, plus some of Bill’s home baking, and we spent a happy hour catching up with each other’s news.

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Time for afternoon tea

We then headed northwards, and Bill and Val were carrying on to Taupo.  We finally arrived at Rotorua at 4.00pm, found our site and soon got settled.

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On site at Rotorua

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Our view from the front windows

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