New Zealand - Day 7

 October 24

We started off our next day by hiking Tutea Falls.

For the most part, the boys were good sports about all the hikes mom and dad wanted to go on . . .

The hike was rewarded with a few hours at Hell's Gate Geothermal Reserve and Mud Spa!!

Before the "mud spa" portion of our time there, we did the trail around the geothermal reserve.

It was pretty cool - there were lush green areas tinged with the rusty orange due to the sulfur, totally vegetation free areas with huge, bubbling mud pools, and other extreme landscapes.

Then came time for the mud spa.  Unfortunately, this is the only picture we got because you couldn't really keep your phone with you.

Needless to say, the boys had a blast spreading mud all over themselves, rinsing off and doing it all over again.

After the mud, they had a cold plunge, which we all tried.

Mom and dad did it once - the boys went back multiple times.

Finally, we just got to hang out in the sulphur pools until our time was up and we moved on to our next activity.

Next on our list was Skyline Rotorua.

To get to all the fun stuff, you take a short gondola ride to the top of the hill.
It was a little rainy, but I don't think anything would have stopped Noah from this item on our itinerary.

We had signed up to go on their luge course.

Of course it would have been too dangerous to take pictures as we were flying down the hillside in our luges, but the picture below is how you get back up to the top of the hill to ride down again, including your luge below you. 

We got to do 5 rides each and there were multiple tracks and we all went super fast and had soooo much fun.  

At the top of the hill, they had a little gift shop as any good tourist attraction does, and Noah wanted his pic taken.  Silly kid.

Our final activity of the day was one mom was looking forward to since we started planning the trip.

The Redwood Walk at Night.

This place was amazing - there are 28 swing bridges, 20 meters high, stretched across 120 year old California Redwoods that were brought to New Zealand all those years ago.

Then at night, they light up these bridges and the area with decorative lanterns.

It was pretty neat and one of the highlights of the trip.