Mud baths and hot rivers

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Leaving Papamoa Beach en route to Tongoriro National Park we stopped at the mud baths of Hells Gate.

*** edit - we would not recommend this activity. It’s fun but it’s expensive and we all got sulphur burns that have lasted for weeks and our clothes smelled like sulphur for days, even ones we didn’t wear in the pools or the next day…

Now on to some posers:

edit - here is Kylie happily not realizing she is burning her face and neck and the red peeling skin will last for weeks…

;-)

And now from Levi’s journal:

We went to the mud pits it was hot mud that you could rub all over you I think my skins smoother than before it was very fun there was also a hot spring and a cold tub it was so fun but now I smell like sulfur.

cont.

After that we went to another hot spring but it was a river. It was really cool because there was lava underneath us. And then there was a waterfall. It was the coolest hot spring Ive been to.

(Marc again) kerosene creek was the highlight of the day for me. 2k up a gravel road. No signs, no change rooms and  best of all free! Bathing in a hot river is a whole different level. We visited this spot on our last time through NZ (pre kids) and we were happy to see that little had changed. A few other families but certainly less busy than the paved versions.

After that we did a serious grocery trip in Taupō, had a picnic on the beach and then drove on to Tongoriro!