Day 103: Tamaki Village

We left our cute cabin hostel in Waitomo early as we had a long day ahead travelling to Rotorua. Before we began this journey, Tahni took us to have a short morning walk in the sunshine. Our first stop was Hobbiton movie set, from Lord of the Rings. Half the passengers stopped here for the tour but the rest of us journeyed onto Rotorua. I have never been into Lord of the Rings so I thought it would be pretty pointless looking round the movie set! Rotorua was really nice, however there was a smell of egg around the town from the geothermic activity under the ground! I had a wonder around Rotorua, it was a lovely hot day. I had my lunch by the lake and sunbathed for a while before heading back to meet the rest of the Kiwi bus. We then departed and made our way to the village where we were greeted by the tribe leader who would look after us for our stay. We decided that our tribe leader would be Adam, a boy from our bus. The Maori leader showed us around the village, where we would eat and where we would sleep. The cabins were really cool and each had around 12 beds in. Once we were settled in and had sung our song 'Wonderwall' to thank the tribe for having us, we then played some traditional Maori games. We then headed to the welcome ceremony which was quite intimidating!! The facial expressions pulled by the tribe members were so scary but it was so exciting to watch. We were then invited into the village to learn more about Maori tribes, which included watching the haka and a dancing/singing performance before we were then served dinner. This meal was incredible, the first home cooked food I'd had in a long time! We went back for seconds and thirds!