The Moari people arrived in New Zealand in 1250, 1350 or 1420, depending on which source you read. Regardless of which is correct, I have to say, it surprised me. I thought they had been here for thousands of years, somewhat similar in fact, to the Aboriginal people of Australia. I don’t know why I thought that, but I did.    
 Our journey through Rotorua brought us to the Maori cultural park. Because the volcanic activity is so close to the surface, there is a natural geyser there that sprays water high into the air on a 30 minute cycle, more or less, and last for about 15 minutes. High pressure water shoots up, spraying all the tourists and causing them to shriek, (in many languages, most of them dialects of Chinese), and covering them, their selfie sticks and their phones with spots of silica, calcium and sulphur deposits. We all rush to wipe our lenses clear before it dries hard.

   
   
Boiling hot gases bubble up through mud pools and steam rises though the rocks all around. You can dig a hole and cook your dinner in the hot steam. Really! That’s what they do here. You can get a dinner included tour here, (if you book months in advance, which we, of course, did not do). I talked to the chef for the night and he showed me where dinner was cooking. In the natural hot steam oven. Steamed chicken all round for tonight’s guests. Of course you don’t have to go to cultural parks for natural volcanic steam cookers. No, no. We had one right on our campsite. So ….. naturally steamed corn-on-the-cob for us. Delicious!!