In the early morning, I hiked out of Waikaremoana. The lake was quiet, with few birds stirring, which was a bit disappointing. I arrived at the car around 11am, and began driving toward Rotorua, a town known for its volcanic (and sulphurous smelling) hot springs, along about 90 miles of gravel road. It was slow going, and Tolstoy again kept me company. I arrived in Rotorua around lunch time and went to a "cafe" recommended by Lonely Planet. I apparently didn't read the entry closely, because it turned out to be a high-end cafe restaurant. This turned out to be a fortuitous mistake, as I ended up having perhaps the absolute best waffle with fruit compote I have ever had!
I then spent a good deal of time on the Internet. I needed to write to Brown to accept their offer of admission, as well as try to set up a place to stay in Sydney. The Australian portion of my trip has the most potential for couchsurfing, so I really needed to get a start on it.
I then, because of my flight to Christchurch, needed to head up to Hamilton, a town about 1:30 south of Auckland at which I had set up a hostel stay. My silly flight means that I have to drive to Hamilton, get set up into the hostel, and then leave the hostel around 2:30am, so that I can drive up to Auckland for my 6:40am flight in plenty of time. Grrr! More and more silly!
The drive went off without incident - well, except for getting lost in Hamilton trying to find the highway to Auckland at 3am...
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