Tauranga, New Zealand

Date: February 13, 2019
Location: Tauranga, New Zealand

After setting sail from Auckland at around 8:00 pm on February 12, we arrived in Tauranga, New Zealand at 9:00 am the next morning. There was not much to do in the area immediately around the cruise ship. As such, we reserved a rental car in advance and took an Uber when we got off the ship to pick it up.

Using the rental car, we drove to Minden lookout for a view over Tauranga, Mount Maunganui and the Bay of Plenty.

From the lookout we drove to Wairere Falls.

I was expecting to drive to the lookout and didn’t realize that we would be hiking. The trail started out flat and went over a stream.

Later on in the hike it started to climb, and there were stairs to get to the final lookout.

This is Wairere Falls, the largest waterfall on the north island at 153 meters, about 502 feet.

After seeing Wairere Falls we drove to Rotorua where we took the Skyline gondola up Mt Ngongotaha.

At the top is the Volcanic Hills Winery tasting room.

We tasted some wine while sitting near the window and enjoying the view.

After that we walked around before taking the gondola back down.

We returned the rental car and got an Uber back to the ship.

This is the view from our balcony as we sailed away from Mount Maunganui.