After the excellent tour from Rotorua to Gisborne I had a quite cozy and relatively cheap accommodation at a campsite in a hut in Gisborne. Due to my still existing jetlag I could get up quite early again and continue my trip. The choice this time was to drive further south, or rather to drive west. I decided for the direction west, because in the end not so many choices existed regarding the roads and drove in the direction of Himatangi Beach to the west coast. In between I made a stop in Napier on the east coast.
🏝️ Driving Route 35 | New Zealand’s Wild East Cape Adventure
I was now able to go on a bit more of an excursion and left Rotorua for a round trip on the North Island. My first goal was to drive east to the sea and then follow the road south along the sea. My final stop for the day was then Gisborne.
🚤 Discover Lake Taupō | NZ’s Largest Lake & Hidden Wonders
This time the round trip went to the southwest of Rotorua. There lies a completely different looking landscape than on the eastern coast, with high mountains of volcanoes and centrally Lake Taupo, which ultimately also forms the caldera of a supervolcano. So I drove from Rotorua towards Taupo, around it and finally also around Mt Ruapehu, the highest mountain of the North Island and back to Rotorua.